Sharing voter data isn’t good for American people

I am alarmed that Trump’s Kris Kobach has requested every voter’s information. This demand for such details about the population is frightening in many different ways. For one, it reminds me of the book IBM and the Holocaust, written by Edwin Black. This book tells the history of how the Nazis, during the 1930s, were able to round up so many non-Aryans in the blink-ofan-eye, because IBM had set up a database of the German people’s various qualities. Many of these same qualities that the Nazis computerized, the Trump administration is now asking every state to turn over to him.

Most states have privacy and secrecy laws in regards to voting. I don’t know if Arkansas has such a law, but the tradition of voter secrecy is an idea that is over 1,000 years old, and was adopted fully by the country’s founders. Whether Arkansas is protected by such a law doesn’t lessen the fact that the Trump administration’s request has an appearance of being unethical.

I realize this information is being sought after so that voter fraud can be investigated. My opinion on that is just let the 38 known national cases of double voting in the last election go. America still has a below-living wage crisis, infrastructure deterioration, climate concerns, excessive gun violence, drug problems, and, oh, let’s not forget the Russia hacking our elections issue.

Even if much of this data is available to any person willing to go and retrieve it, the biggest danger in this list is the all-encompassing nature of having every voter’s information in one location. What any organization can do with such a list would only be limited by their desire and creativity.

Finally, as to uploading any information to an unsecured Internet cloud account, that is clearly an idiot’s folly. Once online, even on a secure server, every hacker with a desire to weaken America will attack. And with Russia, well, Trump will probably just hand them the password.

PIPPIN LOWE Fayetteville