Core U.S. values at play in voter commission fight
WASHINGTON — As the nation celebrates the Declaration of Independence, a growing number of states have cited core American principles — the right to vote, the right to privacy and protection from unwarranted government intrusion — to push back against the Trump administration’s crackdown on nonexistent voter fraud.
Claims of rampant illegal voting — unproven and debunked by just about every authority including the vast majority of state election officials — largely come from one source: President Trump’s Twitter account. In November he tweeted, erroneously: “I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”
Trump then formed the Election Integrity Commission, headed by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, author of some the nation’s most restrictive voter laws. Kobach’s efforts led the ACLU to dub him the “King of Voter Suppression.”
But his request last week to all 50 states and the District of Columbia for information — names, addresses, dates of birth, political party affiliation, the last four digits of Social Security numbers, mothers’ maiden names, voter history and more — has been met with bipartisan defiance.
All told, 32 states are reportedly refusing all or part of the request. Massachusetts Secretary of State William Galvin rejected it outright over privacy concerns.
“This commission needs to understand clearly, disclosure of such sensitive information is more likely to diminish voter participation rather than foster it,” said Republican Secretary of State Tom Schedler of Louisiana. “I have been fighting this kind of federal intrusion and overreach, and will continue to fight like hell for the people who trust me with the integrity of our election process.”
Voting rights groups have also raised flags over Kobach’s plans, saying cross-checking state data with information from the Social Security Administration and other federal agencies could lead to millions of eligible voters being purged from voter rolls based on minor discrepancies.
Worse, the commission could use its work to urge Congress to pass laws making it harder for citizens to register to vote and tougher to prove eligibility at the polls. That would be like setting fire to a house to kill a spider inside: a Brennan Center report found 30 cases of noncitizen voting in the 2016 election — about 1/100,000th the amount claimed by Trump.
Meanwhile a real problem is being ignored: the White House said Trump has no plans to bring up Russian election meddling when he meets this week with President Vladimir Putin — despite the Department of Homeland Security’s assessment that Russian hackers targeted 21 states’ election systems.
That speaks volumes about the priorities of our American president.