elections – R&R – Reachout and Rebuild

Race, Police, Education and Lies: The New Right-Wing Culture War

David Posnett — Sat, 08 May 2021 18:53:54 +0000

May 6, 2021

By Barbara Weber-Floyd reprinted from “The Resistance and Me“

This is the story of how our inability to confront our racist history is fueling a right-wing misinformation campaign against our schools, resulting in contentious, partisan school board elections in district after district around the country.

School board elections tend to be low turnout, non-partisan events. But for many districts, this year is different. On Long Island where I live, one of those races is taking place in the Smithtown Central School District. Three challengers are trying to unseat the incumbents who are up for reelection on May 18^th in a campaign unlike any school board election Smithtown has ever seen.

As in other districts, the opposition to the Smithtown school board began last year because of COVID. In some districts, parent protests were sparked by opposition to mask mandates. In Smithtown, it was opposition to a hybrid COVID modification plan of part in-classroom and part remote learning for the 2020-21 school year that set off protests. Under the slogan, “5 Days to Thrive”, meaning that all children needed to be back in school five days a week to thrive, a group of parents protested against the hybrid model. https://longisland.news12.com/smithtown-parents-continue-to-demand-their-kids-be-allowed-to-return-to-school-5-days-a-week-42529542

This was before vaccines and when the CDC was still recommending six feet between desks. The only way to achieve that was to have half the usual number of children in the classroom at any given time. The schools had moved from all remote learning at the beginning of the lockdown to the hybrid model last fall, just like the vast majority of schools in Suffolk County, but these protesting parents claimed that the board wasn’t trying hard enough to bring their children back full time. They did not view the decision as being in good faith. They claimed it was a conspiracy between the board and the New York State United Teachers (NYSUT) to favor teachers over students.

This past spring, all students came back full time, with almost all teachers and staff being vaccinated and new CDC guidelines. But that did not quiet the protests or the spread of misinformation. They evolved from COVID to the right’s newest boogeyman, critical race theory (CRT). If you are not a consumer of Fox News and other right-wing media, where it has been a major focus for years, you probably never heard of CRT until recently. I know I had not.

Last month, Newsweek focused on states, such as Idaho, passing laws banning CRT from their schools. Below is an excerpt from that article:

Kendall Thomas, a law professor at Columbia University and co-editor of Critical Race Theory: The Key Writings That Formed the Movement, told Newsweek: “CRT maps the nature and workings of ‘institutional racism.’ CRT challenges us to see that racial injustice in America is not, and has never been, just a problem of isolated instances of individual bias and private prejudice which we can solve by enacting ‘color-blind’ laws and policies.”

He added, “The right-wing weaponization of CRT aims to shut down a difficult but necessary conversation about race, racism and the future of democracy in America. The architects of these anti-CRT laws want Americans to stop talking about institutional racism, even if it means trafficking in the reckless politics of racial division they say they oppose.”

https://www.newsweek.com/what-critical-race-theory-why-do-some-want-ban-1587389

The Washington Post published a lengthy article this week about the CRT controversy under the headline, “As schools expand racial equity work, conservatives see a new threat in critical race theory.” It opens with the following sentence: “The nation’s reckoning over race has reached thousands of U.S. schools, and so, too, has a conservative backlash.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/05/03/critical-race-theory-backlash/

Michelle Goldberg, in a May 3^rd column in The New York Times, entitled, “Why the Right Loves Public School Culture Wars,” wrote, “The Christian Coalition took off during Bill Clinton’s presidency, when the religious right engaged locally because it felt shut out of national power. Clearly some conservatives think that opposition to critical race theory could be the seed of something similar. Telling parents that liberals want to make their kids hate their country and feel guilty for being white might be absurd and cynical. It also looks like it might be effective.” https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/03/opinion/public-school-culture-wars.html

I read all the articles. I understood what the right hoped to gain from weaponizing the fears of their base. But I still did not understand why CRT, in and of itself, was controversial. The country was founded on protecting slavery, a Civil War was fought over it and Jim Crow was a Supreme Court sanctioned system of apartheid. Of course, we have systemic racism. Is it better than it was? No one is claiming it isn’t. But to deny that systemic racism still exists in our institutions seems, to me, to require a willful blindness.

As Charles Blow, columnist for The New York Times explained in a column this week, entitled,” Is America Racist?”, “Some will concede the historical point and insist on the progress point, arguing that was then and this is now, that racism simply doesn’t exist now as it did then. I would agree. American racism has evolved and become less blunt, but it has not become less effective. The knife has simply been sharpened. Now systems do the work that once required the overt actions of masses of individual racists.” https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/02/opinion/america-racism.html

One sign of just how charged this issue has become was my inability to convince anyone I spoke to about the Smithtown school board race to go on the record. People supporting the incumbent school board members only felt comfortable speaking to me on background. They were too afraid of being targeted if their names were used. People aligned with the challengers refused to speak to me at all.

When was the moment that the Smithtown parent protests morphed from focusing on COVID to the school board race and CRT? The earliest sign I found was a website called Save Our Schools that went online the end of last year. You might remember the Save Our Schools phrase from a movement a few years ago that supported higher pay for teachers and more equity in public education. This new SOS website had nothing to do with that movement, other than appropriating the name. It was filled with inflammatory rhetoric and accusations that sounded a lot like McCarthy-era fearmongering:

Critical Race Theory was polished in the 1950s and by the time the counterculture phenomena exploded in the 1960s with postmodernism’s entrance into the world’s philosophical framework in the 1970s, it had become a guiding manifesto for action by radical elements like the terrorists at the Black Panther Movement. Today, its contemporary offspring, Black Lives Matter (BLM) along with its symbiotic associate, Antifa, continue the “war of liberation”. https://saveourschools.me/knowledge-is-power/

It was in the downloadable newsletter on the website that I first saw this issue tied to the police. The newsletter is organized under the following section titles: “HOW DO WE SHIELD STUDENTS AGAINST CRT? PROTECTING THE BLUE SO THEY CAN PROTECT YOU. HOW BOE RACES TURNED INTO DO OR DIE ELECTIONS.” https://saveourschools.me/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Save-Our-Schools-April_2021_v2.pdf

I came across an earlier newsletter that was circulating on social media, but was no longer on the website. This one specifically tied the three school board challengers to the SOS website. One of the challengers, Stacy Murphy, is the parent who spoke during the 5 Days to Thrive protests. Below are screenshots of that three-page earlier newsletter.

The website and the newsletter were not the only sources online. Partisan groups started posting about it on social media, all of them spreading the same misinformation about CRT and the school district. They included: Republican Congressman Lee Zeldin, who represents Smithtown, and has announced he is running for governor of New York next year; a fringe group of the Smithtown Republican Party; and the Suffolk Police Benevolent Association (PBA), the police union.

It was highly unusual for any organization, other than NYSUT, to endorse school board candidates. It was particularly upsetting for some residents to see the police union get involved. One Suffolk PBA post went so far as to name a Smithtown teacher and labeled him anti-police because he had signed an online Black Lives Matter petition against having armed policemen, as opposed to security guards, in the school. The PBA used this one teacher as their example of the school’s war on police, which could be stopped only by voting for the three challengers.

I called up the Suffolk PBA and asked for the press office. I stated that I am a journalist with an online blog and I was working on an article about the Smithtown School Board election. I had two questions. Why was the police union getting involved and could you please take down the post that named the teacher? Given the climate, it felt dangerous to me. I was told that the teacher’s social media post was public and therefore fair game. He then said he had no comment for my article and hung up the phone.

I reached out to the three challengers’ campaign through their Facebook page and asked them for an interview. I posed the same question, asking why was the police union getting involved? They did not respond.

The Smithtown BOE tried to remain positive and stick with an upbeat campaign for the three incumbents running for reelection. I shared their virtual postcard on Facebook. The postcard features the incumbents’ accomplishments and the text that accompanied it reminded residents to vote on May 18^th for a board that had shown their support for public education.

But by this time, the anti-CRT messages were going viral on social media. In public and private Facebook groups, heated discussions were taking place for and against CRT, even though there was no evidence that critical race theory was even taught in the Smithtown schools. At the recent school board meetings, the challengers’ supporters were loud and confrontative. It seemed to take the board, which had only just come back to in-person meetings, by surprise. Recordings of the meetings are on the BOE website. http://www.smithtown.k12.ny.us/boardofeducation/board_meeting_audio.

It became clear that the board needed to address the misinformation powering the challengers’ campaign head on. They released the following letter to all Smithtown residents, in both an email and on the district’s public Facebook page.

How astonishing that a school board needed to publicly explain what they were not doing. Will the letter be enough? There is one more school board meeting, on May 11^th, for them to make their case to the public and for parents to ask more questions. The more people understand what is driving this challenge, the more they can make an informed decision. While Smithtown is a conservative-leaning community, a Republican stronghold, I highly doubt they want school board members influenced by misinformation and conspiracies making decisions about the welfare of the teachers and students in their school system.

And for the rest of us, we need to keep a close eye on this new right-wing dog whistle and how it is being employed. In 2009, the Tea Party ran a racially charged misinformation campaign against the first African American president and the passing of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Then, their dog whistles were “birtherism” “death panels” and “socialism.” They successfully rode that campaign back to power, taking back the House in the 2010, the Senate in 2014 and the White House in 2016. I have no doubt that is the intent here.

Notes from a Covid Doc

David Posnett — Mon, 03 Aug 2020 14:57:54 +0000

by Norbert Goldfield MD (August 3rd 2020)

Still Working with Patients with After Effects:

My COVID experiences this week in part revolve around helping one of my patients now permanently disabled from the after-effects of COVID; large numbers of patients refusing needed treatment due to extreme anxiety about COVID exposure, and patients who were COVID positive with continued symptoms almost certainly related to anxiety.

Local COVID Outbreak

A few days ago a local health facility, that I am affiliated with, identified several COVID-19 infected employees and patients on a clinical unit. The facility, being the transparent and thorough facility that it is, identified 23 COVID-positive employees and 12 COVID-positive patients. Contact tracing and testing is being conducted for any patients who test positive. It is likely that the outbreak resulted from several factors: employees who traveled to areas within the United States identified as “hot spots” and were found to be infected after return; staff convening in breakrooms and removing their masks without observing proper social distancing protocols; some staff members coming to work with symptoms; and inappropriate or inconsistent mask use in common- and public areas of the unit. Likely, a combination of these factors contributed to the transmission of the virus. As stated by the hospital, the best tools we currently possess to stave off any resurgence of this virus remain our proven public health interventions:

Hand Hygiene: long before COVID-19 appropriate hand hygiene was known to be highly effective in preventing the transmission of infectious diseases.
Not coming to work with symptoms
Face Masking: There is absolutely no down side; it is a high-value proposition.
Physical/Social Distancing: Last week, the first sentence of an article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences was: Social distancing is the core policy response to coronavirus disease 2019.
Do not participate in communal meals or share food sources (e.g. pizza parties, sandwich platters, cakes, etc.): although this infection is not food-borne, it is transmitted from person-to-person via respiratory secretions. These can contaminate inanimate objects, such as serving utensils, boxes, food, etc. and also contaminate your hands.
Avoid travel to high-risk areas: the reason for this is that such travel will increase the statistical risk of being exposed to COVID-19 and thus, could increase the risk of transmitting it to others upon your return. This is the rationale for the Travel Policy.

Sound familiar?

No National Plan

We still have no national policy that advocates firmly for these measures and provides the financial and organizational resources to implement them. In fact, we will never have a national policy from this administration. For example, because of federal incompetence, we cannot get testing efficiently done, thus missing most cases. I have submitted an op-ed with a colleague advocating that the Democratic-controlled House should step into the spotlight with a plan and use the bully pulpit to advocate for it.

Because many of my patients don’t want to access needed care, health insurers are doing just fine thank you but don’t expect lower premiums! I need to wrap my head around that, when my daughter is faced with stories like this. She is worried about the cost of a COVID test as her health insurance has a high deductible. Let’s keep in our hearts those health professionals who have lost their lives to the pandemic. My response to this overall tragedy is, I continue to work as a health professional on a number of congressional races and try to help steer electoral votes in FL, MI, and PA to Biden by emphasizing, using Jeff Lerner’s phrase, that health professionals advocate a truthful and scientific approach in the form of a ‘political vaccine‘. Feedback always welcome.

Norbert Goldfield, M.D.

Early Voting in Suffolk County, NY

David Posnett — Sat, 13 Jun 2020 16:45:02 +0000

Useful info from the Board Of Elections website for the Democratic Primary Election: https://suffolkcountyny.gov/Departments/BOE/Early-Voting-Sites-6-23-2020

I strongly urge either early voting or mailing in your absentee ballot. This is because they are expecting a huge turn out: about 40,000 voters compared with the prior record of 25,000 voters in the 2018 Dem. primary. Combine a large turnout with a reduced number of polling places and confusion because people can’t find their newly assigned polling places… You see what I mean.

Addendum:

I VOTED! Sunday morning at 11 AM, June 14th. No lines. I was the only voter at the election site in East Hampton (Windmill Village). Over 1.5 days only 42 people had voted early at this site. Everyone wore masks and gloves and observed 6′ distancing, and it felt safer than going to the grocery store.

Voting for Delegates

David Posnett — Sat, 13 Jun 2020 16:14:27 +0000

We received our mail-in ballots. I asked whether we should vote for all 6 delegate candidates. It is confusing for many of us. For example, under Biden’s name, there are 6 candidate delegates listed, see above.

I had received different opinions and someone suggested that voting for all 6 delegate choices defeats your purpose?

Since I personally know one of the delegates I asked them and got the following response:

Biden’s allocation of delegates will be based on the percentage of the total votes that HE gets. This is quite separate from the number of votes each delegate receives. The number of votes each delegate receives will determine who is elected delegate, in descending order, alternating by gender. ie, if 10,000 total votes are cast for POTUS and Biden gets 5,000 votes, he will get 1/2 of the number of delegates in the 1st congressional district (CD NY-01). If you “bullet vote” the delegates (vote for only 2 or 3 out of 6) you increase the chances of those specific delegates of being elected.

Big 5 Battleground Fund

David Posnett — Sun, 27 Oct 2019 22:57:41 +0000

FLORIDA – WISCONSIN – MICHIGAN – PENNSYLVANIA – ARIZONA

While the Democrats obsess over the primary, the GOP is focused on the Big Five states most likely to decide the 2020 general election: Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Florida, & Arizona.

We need to invest now in local groups in these Big Five states. They know how to organize their own communities. But they need our support – today, not next year.

Here is something you can do now: action button.

https://secure.actblue.com/donate/big5-simple?abt=facebook&fbclid=IwAR3dLQbmhfMLplF_YpOBYaJP0-w8eqZIuGCtg-uiekUPqnFJiINyvOtfBA8

Francesca Rheannon, Journalist

Go National or Local?

David Posnett — Mon, 27 Aug 2018 19:38:31 +0000

LTE published August 23rd in the East Hampton Star:

To the Editor:

The East Hampton Star editorial about a “First District Dilemma for Democratic Voters” (July 5, 2018) asks whether one should give money and work for political causes nationally or locally. The question itself goes against the grain of my experience.

There is no dilemma. Giving money to national campaign groups is a good shortcut to supporting national efforts to get money to elections where the money will make the most difference. That doesn’t preclude giving to local candidates.

For people with the time and interest to investigate, and work on, local issues and candidates, the rewards are great. As a canvasser for many political campaigns for six decades, I can testify to its effectiveness and the satisfaction it brings. It’s like investing in companies. You are more likely to succeed, and take pleasure in succeeding, if you understand the product and the prospective buyer. Nothing replaces face-to-face contact.

A successful local political effort is enormously satisfying. You see results in the people you talk to and in the election results. In New York Congressional District 1, my wife, Alice, and I have been supporting Perry Gershon. We were pleased when he won the primary, and ecstatic when his issues-oriented campaign attracted the support after the election of all four of the non-winning candidates.

JOHN TEPPER MARLIN, PH.D.

I would like to add that recent political races have yielded impressive Democratic gains (since early 2017) that were often quite unexpected. One has to wonder what might have happened had folks abandoned their local candidates!

The Dem “swing” average at +16 points in elections held in 2017.

In NY CD-1 the R>D diferential was about 16 points in 2016 for the congressional race. To win, all that is needed is an 8 point Dem swing. That is absolutely feasible in the current environment and given the history of the elections in this district. It is also comparable to what has happened in all the special elections. In other words, no “First District Dilemma for Democratic Voters.”

Flipping the house: an interactive map!

David Posnett

Let’s Vote

David Posnett — Mon, 30 Oct 2017 10:10:13 +0000

Letter to the Editor in the East Hampton Star Oct. 26, 2017

“Self-Defeating”

With two weeks to go, anecdotal evidence suggests that many potential voters in our region: 1. don’t know much, if anything, about individual candidates; 2. are unaware of arguments pro and con about the ballot question on a proposed state constitutional convention, and 3. are indifferent to local elections, citing them as a Sisyphus-like expense of energy and a waste of time. In Springs, where I serve as an elections inspector, the turnout at the last (primary) election was pitiable.

While it has been argued that increased numbers of voters in many areas on the East End would likely benefit Democrats over Republicans, especially if more newly enfranchised people turned out to vote, that view has not translated into action. For Democrats, some of whom are still fighting the Sanders-Clinton rift, the results have been self-defeating.

Cynicism is not only a cliché, it is impractical. Numbers count, psychologically as well as demographically, and attract money. Off-year elections presage larger contests, and none is more important for Democrats than capturing the congressional seat for Congressional District 1 held by Trump mini-me Lee Zeldin. Surely every registered Democrat in our region knows someone who is eligible to vote. Sending a so-called message by not voting discourages candidates who have civil and constructive contributions to make to the growth of our region and the fate of our country.

Let it be noted that, as mandated by the board of elections, inspectors with Democratic affiliation serve alongside Republican colleagues and respect the nonpartisan rules of service at the polls.

JOAN BAUM

Voter fraud commission may have violated law — TheHill.com

David Posnett — Thu, 06 Jul 2017 01:44:45 +0000

BY LYDIA WHEELER AND MIKE LILLIS – 07/05/17 06:07 PM

President Trump’s voter fraud commission may have violated the law by ignoring federal requirements governing requests for information from states, several experts on the regulatory process told The Hill.

Experts say the failure to submit the request to states through the Office of Management and Budget’s Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) violates a 1980 law known as the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA). They also say the failure could be significant, since states could argue it means they are under no obligation to respond.

“If the commission gets heavy-handed with them, it seems to me that the states are within their right to say, ‘No, we don’t have to respond because you didn’t go through [OIRA],’” said Susan Dudley, a former OIRA administrator who is now director of the GW Regulatory Studies Center at George Washington University.

The Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity asked all 50 states and the District of Columbia for extensive information last week on their voters, including full names and addresses, political party registration and the last four digits of Social Security numbers.

The request is part of work the panel is doing to promote fair and honest federal elections. It was formed after Trump said he only lost the popular vote in last year’s presidential election to Hillary Clinton because of widespread voter fraud, an argument rejected by state election officials from both parties.

A number of states have reacted to the requests with anger, arguing they represent a severe overreach by the federal government. Forty-four states led by Republican and Democratic governments, as well as the District of Columbia, are already resisting turning over information, according to multiple news outlets.

After an initial version of this story was published online, the White House in an email argued that the election commission is exempt from the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act, which requires federal agencies to take specific steps before making requests for public information. The reason is simple, according to a spokesman: The commission is not an agency.

“The Paperwork Reduction Act only applies to information collections by agencies,” Marc Lotter, spokesman for Vice President Pence, said in an email. “The Commission is an entity that ‘serve[s] solely to advise and assist the President,’ and is not, therefore, an agency subject to PRA.”

Experts interviewed by The Hill said they believed that the commission did fall under the Paperwork Reduction Act, a 1980 law that requires federal agencies to seek public input, including through a comment period, before making a request for information. A 1995 amendment extended OIRA’s authority to include not only requests for information for the government, but also requests for information to the public.

There are some exemptions from the Paperwork Act’s requirements, but Richard Belzer, a former OIRA economist, said in an email to The Hill that he didn’t recall Trump’s executive order including any provision that would exempt the commission from following the requirements.

Belzer said it would not be unprecedented for OIRA to wave through an approval or issue an exemption at the request of the White House, but he argued this would be “legally dubious” in this case.

The Paperwork Reduction Act defines “agency” very broadly and exempts only requests for information from the Government Accountability Office and the Federal Election Commission from having to follow the requirements of the law. So the voter commission and the type of information it is requesting would be covered.

The law requires that agencies justify their requests for public information, specify how it will be used and provide assurances that data will be protected. The law also obliges the agencies to estimate how many hours it will take entities to respond.

When a request is submitted, documents get a control or reference number from the Office of Management and Budget. No marking is apparent on the letter sent from the Commission to the states, which led several experts on the process to question whether it had gone through the process.

In a letter Monday, United to Protect Democracy and the Brennan Center for Justice called on Trump budget director Mick Mulvaney to take action against the commission for failing to follow the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act.

“The PRA reflects a longstanding recognition that when agencies collect information from the public, they must do it in a way that balances legitimate governmental need with the burdens such collections may impose,” the groups said. “To ensure that balance, the statute requires agencies to engage with the public before embarking on such collections. The Advisory Commission has plainly violated those requirements.”

Stuart Shapiro, a professor at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University, told The Hill that a review can take anywhere from six to nine months to complete — a time frame that can be grating to agencies.

Shapiro raised the possibility that the commission violated the Paperwork Reduction Act in a blog post for The Regulatory Review on Wednesday.

He noted that the commission’s letter to the states did not include any indication that its request for information had been submitted for review through the PRA process.

Though the commission asked states to willingly hand over the information, Shapiro said both voluntary and mandatory requests are required to follow the law.

“I think it shows a carelessness in their desire to come in and shake things up and do what they want and to do so with a disregard for the rules,” said Shapiro, who is also a contributor to The Hill.

“We saw it with the immigration ban, we saw it with the court overturning the delay of the methane rules,” he said, referring to a federal appeals court decision on Monday that prevents the administration from suspending enforcement of a rule restricting methane emissions.

“They aren’t following the rules, and when you don’t follow the rules, eventually someone points that out and you have to go back and follow them.”

Trump has been fixated on voter fraud since the election, which found Clinton winning the popular vote by almost 3 million ballots. Trump claimed that the popular vote would have been his “if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”

Dozens of state election officials from both parties have said there is no evidence of significant voter fraud.

Those conclusions have done nothing to dissuade the president, however, and in May he created the 15-member Election Integrity commission to identify the breadth of voter fraud and other improprieties that might compromise the election process.

Kris Kobach, the Kansas secretary of state who heads Trump’s election commission, defended the request on Wednesday and said media reports that it has been rejected by dozens of states are overheated.

“At present, only 14 states and the District of Columbia have refused the Commission’s request for publicly available voter information,” Kobach, a
Republican, said in a statement issued through the Pence’s office. Stories that suggest a larger number are fake news, he added.

Kobach, a prominent anti-immigration activist, is vying to become Kansas’s governor next year. On Monday, a watchdog group filed a complaint alleging that Kobach is using his position atop the election panel to promote his campaign.

Presidential Commission Demands Massive Amounts of State Voter Data

David Posnett — Thu, 29 Jun 2017 23:00:01 +0000

nb. This data will be made public, including Social Security numbers, if state databases contain it. Privacy? Who cares in the face of .000004% voter fraud? Identity theft? Not Kris Kobach’s problem. Where is the leadership in this administration?

A commission created by President Donald Trump to enhance confidence in America’s elections has asked all 50 states for copies of their voter records which often include names, addresses and ages. The commission has said it intends to make the information widely available.

by Jessica Huseman
ProPublica, June 29, 2017, 6 p.m.

People cast their ballots in the 2016 presidential election at Freedom Academy Elementary School on November 8, 2016, in Provo, Utah. (George Frey/Getty Images)

On Wednesday, all 50 states were sent letters from Kris Kobach — vice chair for the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity — requesting information on voter fraud, election security and copies of every state’s voter roll data.

The letter asked state officials to deliver the data within two weeks, and says that all information turned over to the commission will be made public. The letter does not explain what the commission plans to do with voter roll data, which often includes the names, ages and addresses of registered voters. The commission also asked for information beyond what is typically contained in voter registration records, including Social Security numbers and military status, if the state election databases contain it.

President Donald Trump established the commission through an executive order on March 11. Its stated goal is to “promote fair and honest Federal elections” and it is chaired by Vice President Mike Pence. The commission plans to present a report to Trump that identifies vulnerabilities in the voting system that could lead to fraud and makes recommendations for enhancing voters’ confidence in election integrity. No deadline has been set for completion of the work.

A number of experts, as well as at least one state official, reacted with a mix of alarm and bafflement. Some saw political motivations behind the requests, while others said making such information public would create a national voter registration list, a move that could create new election problems.

“You’d think there would want to be a lot of thought behind security and access protocols for a national voter file, before you up and created one,” said Justin Levitt, a professor at Loyola University School of Law and former Department of Justice civil rights official. “This is asking to create a national voter file in two weeks.”

David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation & Research, also expressed serious concerns about the request. “It’s probably a good idea not to make publicly available the name, address and military status of the people who are serving our armed forces to anyone who requests it,” he said.

Kobach, the secretary of state in Kansas, has been concerned about voter fraud for years. His signature piece of legislation was a law requiring Kansans to show proof of citizenship when they register to vote, which is currently ensnarled in a fraught court battle with the American Civil Liberties Union. He has written that he believes people vote twice with “alarming regularity,” and also that non-citizens frequently vote. Multiple studies have shown neither happens with any consistency.

Kobach also runs the Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck Program, a proprietary piece of software started by Kansas Secretary of State Ron Thornburgh in 2005. Under the program, 30 states pool their voter information and attempt to identify people who are registered in more than one state.

Some expect the information Kobach has requested will be used to create a national system that would include data from all 50 states.

It is not uncommon for voters to be registered in more than one state. Many members of Trump’s inner circle — including his son-in-law Jared Kushner and daughter Tiffany Trump — were registered to vote in two states. Given the frequency with which voters move across state lines and re-register, the act of holding two registrations is not in itself fraud. There is no evidence to suggest that voting twice is a widespread problem, though experts say removing duplicate registrations are a good practice if done carefully.

“In theory, I don’t think we have a problem with that as an idea, but the devil is always in the details,” said Dale Ho, the director of the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project. While he believes voter registration list maintenance is important, he says Kobach’s Crosscheck program has been repeatedly shown to be ineffective and to produce false matches. A study by a group of political scientists at Stanford published earlier this year found that Crosscheck highlighted 200 false matches for every one true double vote.

“I have every reason to think that given the shoddy work that Mr. Kobach has done in this area in the past that this is going to be yet another boondoggle and a propaganda tool that tries to inflate the problem of double registration beyond what it actually is,” Ho said.

Some experts already see sloppy work in this request. On at least one occasion, the commission directed the letter to the incorrect entity. In North Carolina, it addressed and sent the letter to Secretary of State Elaine Marshall, who has no authority over elections or the voter rolls. In that state, the North Carolina Board of Elections manages both.

Charles Stewart, a professor at MIT and expert in election administration, said it was proof of “sloppy staff work,” and questioned the speed at which the letter was sent. “It seems to me that the data aren’t going anywhere. Doing database matching is hard work, and you need to plan it out carefully,” he said. “It’s a naïve first undertaking by the commission, and reflects that the commission may be getting ahead of itself.”

Connecticut Secretary of State Denise Merrill, who oversees voting in the state, said she was dismayed about the commission’s failure to be clearer about what its intentions are. In a statement, Merrill said her office would share publicly available information with the commission. But she said that “in the same spirit of transparency” her office would request the commission “share any memos, meeting minutes or additional information as state officials have not been told precisely what the Commission is looking for.”

“This lack of openness is all the more concerning, considering that the Vice Chair of the Commission, Kris Kobach, has a lengthy record of illegally disenfranchising eligible voters in Kansas,” she wrote.

Alabama’s Republican Secretary of State John Merrill (no relation) also indicated he had questions for Kobach regarding how much of the data would be made public and how Alabamans’ privacy would be protected, even while he expressed support for the commission. “Kobach is a close friend, and I have full confidence in him and his ability, but before we turn over data of this magnitude to anybody we’re going to make sure our questions are answered,” he said.

Colorado Secretary of State Republican Wayne Williams, for his part, said he was not concerned with what the commission planned to do with the data. “Just like when we get a [public-records] request, we don’t demand to know what they are going to do with the data,” he said. “There are important reasons why the voter roll is publicly available information.”

The extent to which voter roll data is public varies across the country. While some states, like North Carolina, make their voter rolls available for free download, other states charge high fees. Alabama, for example, charges one cent per voter in the roll for a total cost of more than $30,000. The state law provides a waiver for government entities, so Merrill said the commission would receive the data for free. Other states, like Virginia, do not make this information public beyond sharing it with formal campaigns and political candidates. When ProPublica tried to purchase Illinois’ voter roll, our request was denied because they only release it to government entities for privacy reasons. Illinois did not respond to a request regarding whether they would release this information to the PCEI, which — while a government entity — intends to make the information public.

The letter from the commission also asks quite broad questions of state elections officials.

“What changes, if any, to federal election laws would you recommend to enhance the integrity of federal elections?” asks the first question. The letter also asked for all information and convictions related to any instance of voter fraud or registration fraud, and it solicited recommendations “for preventing voter intimidation or disenfranchisement.”

“The equivalent is, ‘Hey, doctors, what changes would you suggest regarding healthcare? Let us know in two weeks,’” said Levitt, the Loyola professor. “If I were a state election official, I wouldn’t know what to do with this.”

While the commission is being chaired by Vice President Mike Pence, Kobach signed the letter alone. Jon Greenbaum, chief counsel for the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said this is an indication that Kobach — not Pence — “will be running the show,” which he said should be a point of concern.

“As we know with Kobach, he’s obsessed with trying to identify voter fraud and finds it in a lot of places where it doesn’t exist,” he said.

Vanita Gupta, the former acting head of the Department of Justice’s civil rights division under President Barack Obama, said the commission’s letter was an indication the commission was “laying the groundwork” to carry out changes to the National Voter Registration Act that might seek to restrict access to the polls.

The National Voter Registration Act — sometimes called the Motor Voter Act — was enacted in 1993. It allows the DOJ the authority to ensure states to keep voter registration lists, or voter rolls, accurate and up-to-date. It also requires states to offer opportunities for voter registration at all offices that provide public assistance (like the DMV).

In November, Kobach was photographed holding a paper addressing national security issues and proposing changes to the voter registration law. It is not clear what these changes were. The ACLU is involved in a lawsuit against Kansas’ state law requiring people to show proof of citizenship in order to register to vote. As part of the suit, ACLU lawyers requested access to the document reflecting the changes Kobach proposed.

Originally Kobach told the court the document was beyond the scope of the lawsuit, but last week the court found the documents were relevant and that Kobach had intentionally misled the court. He was fined $1,000 for the offense and required him to turn the document over. It has not yet been made public.

Gupta said her concern about the future of the voter registration act was deepened by the fact that, on Thursday, the DOJ sent a letter to the 44 states covered by the act requesting information on the maintenance of their voter rolls. States were given 30 days to answer a set of detailed questions about their policies for list maintenance.

“The timing of the letters being issued on the same day is curious at the very least,” she said.

The White House and the DOJ all did not respond to requests for comment about the letters.

The letter did not ask about compliance with the portions of the act that require states to attempt to expand the voter base, such as by offering voter registration forms and information in public offices.

Danielle Lang, deputy director of voting rights for The Campaign Legal Center, said the focus on list maintenance troubled her. While she said this might point to a new direction in enforcement for the DOJ’s voting rights section, it was too early to tell how this information might be used.

Levitt said he did not recall a time when the DOJ has previously requested such broad information. While the information is public and not, on its face, troubling, Levitt said the only time he recalled requesting similar information was during targeted investigations when federal officials suspected a state was not complying with the law.

Some Of Trump’s New Election Investigators Don’t Seem To Have Much Election Experience

David Posnett — Thu, 22 Jun 2017 21:26:02 +0000

Sometimes I think that I’m on the set of a “Dukes of Hazard” episode — BAC

Posted on HuffPost

“I’m just a very small old country boy from Arkansas in this bigger commission with Vice President Pence, and I’m just going to do the best I can, to be honest.”

By Sam Levine

President Donald Trump quietly announced Wednesday evening he intended to appoint three more people to a commission to investigate voter fraud, but two of the people he wants to appoint don’t seem to have any expertise in voting issues or elections.

The three officials named were Luis Borunda, the deputy secretary of state of Maryland; David Dunn, a former Arkansas Democratic state lawmaker; and Mark Rhodes, a county clerk in West Virginia.

Dunn, who served in the Arkansas legislature from 2005 to 2011 and now runs a government relations firm, said he was eating dinner with his children when the White House sent out a press release announcing the president intended to appoint him to the commission. Arkansas Secretary of State Mark Martin (R), an old friend of Dunn’s from the legislature, recommended him to the commission, Dunn said. He said he also spoke with Kris Kobach, the Kansas secretary of state and the commission’s vice chair, just once about his interest in the role, but didn’t expect much to come of it until he saw the White House’s press release.

The commission, which will be led by Kobach and Vice President Mike Pence, is charged with examining election systems to study the issues that undermine and affect confidence in them.

In a Thursday interview, Dunn sounded openly stunned he was chosen for the role and admitted he did not have any expertise in elections or voting issues.

“I don’t know why this has fallen on my shoulders,” he told HuffPost, adding that he was concerned about voters’ access to the polls, particularly in rural areas of the state. “I’m just a very small old country boy from Arkansas in this bigger commission with Vice President Pence, and I’m just going to do the best I can, to be honest.”

I don’t know why this has fallen on my shoulders.”David Dunn, former Arkansas state representative.

Critics are closely watching the probe and say it is an unnecessary effort to try to justify Trump’s unsubstantiated claim that millions voted illegally in the 2016 election. Several studies and investigations have shown voter fraud is not a widespread problem. Many have been particularly alarmed by Trump’s decision to tap Kobach to lead the commission, since Kobach has pushed some of the most restrictive voting laws in the country in his state and has a history of exaggerating voter fraud. Kobach is now also running for governor of Kansas.

Dunn said he didn’t believe millions voted illegally in 2016, and he said Kobach told him he wasn’t looking for people who would just go along with what the commission wanted. Dunn also said he didn’t think the commission would look into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, even though two of its members told The Boston Globe they thought the hacking should be part of the committee’s inquiry.

Borunda, the Maryland deputy secretary of state, didn’t return a request for comment. An online biography detailing his portfolio doesn’t make any mention of work on voting or elections. He formed a Hispanic commission to support the campaign of Maryland Gov. Bob Ehrlich (R) in 2003 and has served on the Maryland Economic Development Commission and the Baltimore Board of Education. His biography notes he’s responsible for handling the operations of the secretary of state’s office.

Jennifer Bevan-Dangel, executive director of Common Cause Maryland, called Borunda’s appointment “bizarre” because elections in Maryland are administered by the state Board of Elections, not the secretary of state’s office. Bevan-Dangel noted Borunda’s LinkedIn page lists an expertise in “non-profit, start up organization, visionary, branding & graphic design,” but not voting.

“Maryland is a great state to draw on expertise from. We have a state board that has really been paving the way working with other states ensuring that voter rolls are up to date and developing ways for interstate cooperation,” she said. “There was an incredible opportunity to tap into that expertise and instead we’ve tapped into someone, I’m not sure what expertise he can bring to the table.”

Kobach’s office did not return a request for comment on the appointments.

Of the three new people Trump intends to appoint, the only one with deep election experience is Mark Rhodes, the county clerk in Wood County, West Virginia. Rhodes said he spoke with Kobach after West Virginia Secretary of State Mac Warner (R) recommended him for the position a month ago. While he found out he had passed a background check for the position, he wasn’t formally notified of Trump’s intention to nominate him until he saw the White House’s press release.

As someone with experience administering elections, Rhodes said, he could offer the commission an on-the-ground perspective. He oversees elections for 56,000 registered voters in a county with a population of 82,000 people, and said his office went through death certificates and obituaries every day to make sure its voter rolls were accurate and up to date.

Rhodes, who won a 2014 election by just five votes, said he had seen no evidence of voter fraud in his county, but was open to the commission investigating it. He dismissed the concern the commission was intent on finding evidence of voter fraud.

“It’s not gonna hurt. If the commission would improve the voters’ or the people’s security, that their vote is counted and counted correctly, then it’s gonna help,” he said. “I have a preconceived notion that there is no election fraud, and that’s here in Wood County, West Virginia.”

The other Democratic members of the commission are Maine Secretary of State Matt Dunlap and New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner. The Republicans are Kobach, Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson and former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell. Christy McCormick, a commissioner on the Election Assistance Commission, is also serving.

This article has been updated with comment from Bevan-Dangel.