An elections official in North Carolina, appointed by the state, tendered his resignation on Thursday following his arrest on charges of tampering with his granddaughters’ ice cream by introducing illicit drugs.
James Edwin Yokeley Jr., 66, had been chairman of the Surry County Board of Elections before he submitted his letter of resignation.
“This decision has not been made lightly,” Yokeley mentioned in his letter to the board. “After significant prayer, careful thought, and consultation, I have determined that for the well-being of the State Board of Elections, considering my unjustly accused situation, it is best to resign at this time.”
On August 8, Yokeley visited a Sheetz gas station and alerted a nearby police officer that “his two young granddaughters had discovered two hard objects in the ice cream they recently purchased from the Dairy Queen” approximately four miles away, as detailed in a police statement from Wilmington.
The girls didn’t consume the pills which were later tested and found to be “illegal narcotics,” police said.
Footage from the Dairy Queen’s surveillance revealed that Yokeley “was the one who placed the two pills into both victims’ ice cream,” according to the police.
Yokeley was booked on suspicion of contaminating food with a controlled substance and felony child abuse, police said.
Messages left at publicly listed phone numbers of the suspect, his family and workplace were not immediately returned on Thursday.
In his resignation letter, Yokeley expressed: “With trust in truth and facts, I am prayerfully confident that I will be cleared of all charges against me.”
Yokeley was appointed by State Auditor Dave Boliek to the Surry County elections board in June last year. Boliek was unavailable for immediate comment on Thursday.
Yokeley had previously run for a seat on the Surry County Board of Education. He was a relatively competitive third-place finisher in the 2022 Republican primary for the District 4 race, finishing with 26.69% of the vote.
Throughout that local campaign, Yokeley focused on his grievances with national Covid policies and whether votes in 2020 federal elections were properly counted, according to race winner T.J. Bledsoe.
“I disagreed with some ways that things were handled with masks and those types of things (during the pandemic) but it was over by then. We had moved forward,” Bledsoe told NBC News on Thursday. “I think we were all confused (by Yokeley’s Covid and voting focus in a local race).”
After falling short in that race, Yokeley continued to use that campaign’s social media to advocate for anti-vaccine stances.
He cited the Children’s Health Defense, the non-profit of anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., on Nov. 21, 2022 saying a “wave of justice is swelling against employers” mandating vaccination against Covid.
In a Dec. 7. 2022 posting, Yokeley said “big pharma” and the federal government were lying about Covid vaccines that he claims — with no evidence — have “caused more adverse effects and deaths than all previous vaccines combined.”
Studies have overwhelmingly demonstrated that Covid vaccines are safe and effective, and that most side effects are mild or moderate.
