EXCLUSIVE: ‘Liberty Is Messy’: Founder of True the Vote Gears Up for 2024

Catherine Engelbrecht on part of her 500-mile hike on the El Camino de Santiago pilgrimage trail in Leon, Spain, in May 2023. Catherine Engelbrecht

The lights are never off in prison, so Catherine Engelbrecht lost her sense of time; she thinks it was the early morning hours when she stood in line at the Montgomery Processing Center, a Conroe, Texas immigration detention prison, awaiting an uncomfortable medical assessment.

Engelbrecht founded the election integrity and voter’s rights organization True the Vote in 2010, and she and Gregg Phillips, a True the Vote contractor, were subjects of the film “2,000 Mules,” which followed the group’s investigation of activity around drop boxes in the 2020 election. Investigating election integrity means challenging powerful people. It has not been comfortable.

Even though she was an American citizen, and had not entered the U.S. illegally, in October 2022, however, she spent nine days in solitary confinement at a federal immigration detention prison.

“I’m thinking, what the hell? I shouldn’t even be here, having to do what I’m about to do. I mean, really? This is actually happening?” Engelbrecht told The Epoch Times.

Gregg Phillips, whose investigation into voter fraud, is featured in "2000 Mules.” Salem Media Group/Screenshot via The Epoch Times

Phillips was also imprisoned—both for contempt of court—after he and she refused to disclose the name of a confidential FBI informant in a civil defamation lawsuit brought by elections software company Konnech, Inc. The company didn’t like what True the Vote said about it, but later dropped the suit.

The woman in front of Engelbrecht in that prison line turned around. “She said, ‘Just remember, sweetie, in here, your life is not your own,’ and it hit me, to the marrow of my bones. Because that was true in there. But it’s not true here,” Engelbrecht said, speaking on her phone with birds chirping cheerily in the background. “This is free. And voting is free. And our country is good. And it’s worth working for. We shouldn’t take it for granted, because it can all be gone. We are in perilous times, but it is not over. We need people to wake up. If people wake up and serve, then game, set, match. We win. We get our country back for our kids.”

Reasons for Optimism

Engelbrecht has had a lot of time to think about how to do that. She returned to the United States after taking a 400- mile hike on the El Camino de Santiago pilgrimage trail in Spain, a spiritual trek that has been taken by thousands since medieval times. Walking in solitude for three and a half weeks offers time for prayer and reflection. Through that, she landed on the word believe.

“Just believe. Do not doubt. If I have said to you that I will deliver this nation, then believe it. Don’t doubt me,” Engelbrecht thought about God’s promises as she walked. “My resolve is redoubled. I know that I’m in this for the right reasons. I know why I believe what I believe. I am not a perfect person, but I am committed to this cause. I believe we win.”

The pilgrimage got her head straight about what’s coming, she said, predicting that the 2024 election will be the battle royale for the soul the republic.

“We’re going to decide whether or not citizens care enough about freedom to actually step in and figure out what they can do to stop this runaway freight train that has become governance by dysfunction.”

She is optimistic, because after 2020, people woke up and started asking questions. Many people studied election processes in their states and election integrity groups formed around the country. More people are watching the complicated innerworkings of elections than in the past. Elections were meant to be run by the people, she said.

“It’s been a tough learning curve. There’s been a lot of misinformation. But that’s just a part of liberty. Liberty is messy. It’s not always going to be perfect. The key is to stay standing, keep asking the questions, and not get shut down or overwhelmed.”

“We need to have a very serious national discussion on the way we cast and count votes so that it is fair to everyone. And technology and data exist to do this,” Engelbrecht said. “The only reason it’s not happening is because the weaknesses in the process can be manipulated and exploited for political gain.”

Focus on Process

True the Vote founder and president Catherine Engelbrecht describes how organized ballot trafficking appears to be behind the 2020 election in Arizona during an informational meeting with state lawmakers in Phoenix on May 31. Allan Stein/The Epoch Times

It is time to fight, Engelbrecht said.

“As a constitutional republic, we can fight through the power of our vote. That is the way it’s supposed to work.” But that is more than showing up on election day and wearing an ‘I voted’ sticker and never questioning what is going on behind the scenes. That makes us easy prey for political types,” Engelbrecht said. “I think it’s important for citizens to understand they have a role to play. In my opinion, every citizen who can, should serve in an election process. See it for yourself. You'll see the dysfunction.”

As part of its 2024 platform, True the Vote has plans on numerous fronts. It aims to have election rules well defined before the election.

“What happened in 2020 has been happening, inch by inch by inch in elections for decades,” Engelbrecht said. “And then in 2020 it was just like, blow the doors off, lawlessness reigns, do whatever you want, it doesn’t matter. Then you try to take it to court after the fact, and it’s so highly political, no court is going to get involved.”

True the Vote is interested in supporting efforts to ensure that laws are followed in the 2024 cycle.

“There are many tragic cases in these last few years that have led to an increased disconnect between the American voter and the integrity of our elections because the laws are not being followed. So in those places where we know that to be true, what can be done preemptively to solve that through the courts? That is part of what we’re evaluating right now.”

True the Vote, or individual voters, may ask the court for declaratory relief from illegal procedures that says, preemptively, these things will not be allowed in 2024 because they are against the law, she explained. This way it doesn’t have anything to do with who won or lost or who is on the ballot.

The court could rule now, outside of the political pressure present in the aftermath of an election. Then, if an election process is out of line with federal or state law, it must be remedied now, or the coming election will not be able to be certified.

“There are certain checkpoints that must be adhered to, that are not, and it runs all the way top to bottom,” Engelbrecht said. “From the use of machines, to the use of vendors, to the process of security around document management, all the things that have been proven in court.

There were so many good court cases brought, and they were so often kicked to the curb because it became about who won or lost. What we’re saying is, it’s not about who won or lost. It’s about the fairness and the legality of the process.”

Band Together

True the Vote is building a library of podcasts and videos for voters to learn about election systems and the power of citizen engagement.

And it has three movies in the works. One is related to elections software company Konnech. Another is a look at how the rest of the world votes compared to the United States.

“It’s a sack of lies that voter ID is racist and that voting by mail over a month is normal. Nothing could be further from the truth.” Other countries manage to get voting done in a day, she said. “Every industrialized nation has some form of photo voter identification …The United Nations doesn’t even recognize elections conducted by mail because they’re so prone to fraud. And yet we let this become the new normal.”

Another film looks at what happened in the primary between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

“Hillary should have been the rightful nominee, and it went to Obama,” Engelbrecht said. “Our goal there is to catch up that storyline. I point out to people that it really is a selection, not an election, and nowhere is that truer than in the primaries.”

For too long, she says, too many citizens have not been involved in the political process beyond voting, and now it will take every ounce of time, energy, and effort to restore freedoms we have ceded because we got comfortable for a long time and didn’t have to fight.

“There’s reason to be concerned. There’s reason to take action now. But there’s not reason to fear. Fear is a liar,” Engelbrecht said. “To suggest we should fear tells me that we have no option because we are without hope. In the broad liberty movement, it’s very easy to point out problems and talk about how they’re all going to lead to our imminent demise. What’s much more difficult is to provide solutions and to provide a path and to say, honestly, this is going to take some time, and it’s gonna take some elbow grease, but we can do this, and come at it from a place of being honorable to the process.”

As someone who was put in prison, she says she understands political injustice.

“But we have got to rise above that, for the sake of our country and our children, and put solutions together. Enough with all of the name calling. We’ve got to band together and solve the problem.”