Rensselaer County elections commissioner resigns, changing plea to guilty

Troy — Rensselaer County Republican elections board commissioner Jason Schofield resigned on Wednesday night, and will now plead guilty to federal charges of fraudulently obtaining and filing absentee ballots. Schofield's change in plea was first reported by the Times Union.

Schofield's attorney confirmed the change in plea to CBS6 on Thursday, as Schofield is now expected to plead guilty when he appears in court on January 11th. Schofield, who was arrested by the FBI in September, was reelected by the Rensselaer County Legislature to a second term as Republican Elections Commissioner on December 13th. Every Republican voted yes in the 16-2 result, adding 4 of the 6 Democrats on the legislature to the yes total as well.

"I am so disappointed in the county legislature," Democrat Peter Grimm, one of the two "no" votes on the bill, says. "Politics came before governance. The people of Troy have been robbed, they've been robbed of their rights, of their will of their choices, and it's been proven."

Grimm says ones of the reasons he voted no was in reference to the lawsuit filed by the state Attorney General in 2021 against the Rensselaer County Board of Elections. In that case, a judge ruled the Rensselaer County BOE failed to provide voters with adequate and equitable access to early voting poll sites, specifically communities of color.

Schofield was the Republican BOE commissioner at the time, while Edward McDonough was the Democrat BOE commissioner.

"The Justice Center had been very concerned the fact there were no early voting sites for people of color," President of the Justice Center of Rensselaer County Bob Blackmon says. "We were very upset with both members of the elections commissioners."

Despite the lawsuit and the arrest, the entirety of the Republican majority voted to keep Schofield as Elections Commissioner.

"We believed he was innocent until proven guilty," Republican legislator Scott Bendett says. "After the change in plea, we immediately asked for his resignation, and he gave it to us."

As for the four Democrats who voted to keep Schofield for another four years, the bill included both Schofield and Democrat Mary Sweeney, and legislators had to vote for both, or neither. Grimm, who voted no, says Sweeney was a qualified candidate would've been appointed regardless of how long the process took to find a Republican candidate.

"The four Democrats stood on the floor and they said it would be the first woman to be in Rensselaer County," Grimm says . "They also said she was a friend, so they were voting for a person who was a friend. I don't think those are valid reasons."

While Schofield will enter his plea before the court in a few weeks, the federal investigation continues in Rensselaer County, with justice advocates saying they're hoping more democracy will prevail moving forward.