State will fight ICE over voter records subpoenas
Request for eight years of data called ‘unreasonable.’
WASHINGTON olina’s attorney — general North Car- can fight Immigration and Customs Enforcement subpoenas issued last month to the state and 44 counties for eight years of voting records, the state elections board voted unanimously Friday.
r an executive session held behind closed doors, the State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement voted Friday around 11 a.m. to authorize Attorney General Josh Stein’s office to fight the subpoenas sent to the state and county elections boards. It cited the broad scope of the subpoena request.
“The subpoena we’ve received was and remains overly broad, unreasonable, vague, significant and interests clearly impacts of our voters,” said Joshua Malcolm, vice chairman of the state board. “This Board will ... not stand idly by and consent to any agency attempt- ing to obtain records and documents that violate the principles of overreach by the federal government, as in this circumstance.”
The state board has four Democrats, cans and one four independent Republi- among its nine members.
Separate subpoenas sent to the 44 counties covered by the Eastern District of North Carolina asked for more information. The Wake County subpoena, for example, poll voting requested books, records, e-poll and/or “any books, and voter all authorization documents, and executed official ballots (including absentee official ballots), that were submit- ted to, filed by, received by, and/or Wake tions from County maintained August Board 30, of by Elec- 2013 the through Originally, August the date 30, for 2018.” proSept. ducing 25. the documents was
Sebastian Kielmanovich, the assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina, wrote to the state board Thursday offer- ing to push the deadline for the voting records to Janu- ary if the board and the 44 county board of elections promised to preserve the requested records. Penry said the state board “doesn’t have any intention of destroy- ing the documents . ... The documents are going to be there.”
The original request, the state board said, would have included more than 2.3 million “traceable” ballots, meaning voters’ actual ballot choices would have been identifiable. In his let- ter, Kielmanovich asked that “actual vote information be redacted,” claiming the inquiry was not interested in who voters voted for. Penry said by bly the prevent Friday state that General North laws Carolina Assem- passed from disclosing that infor- mation. Penry said the board, which has worked with the Eastern District of North Car- olina in the past on potential criminal violations, received no advance warning of the subpoena. The subpoena arrived via fax at 5 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 31, the start of the three-day Labor Day weekend. “We had lawyers here that could have been contacted in advance and could still be contacted to address this matter,” He said Penry the board said. has not been ICE wants given a the reason documents. as to why The Southern Coalition for Social Justice sent a memo to the state board of elec- tions Thursday evening, outlining its objections to complying urging sively resist” with the board the against request to “aggres- the sub- and poenas. profit The that Durham-based aids those working nonfor the social board’s commend justice decision applauded the Friday. State Board defend for the taking privacy steps inter- to ests of North Carolina voters and to prevent likely unlawful fishing expeditions by the federal government that tends to fuel voter suppression and intimidation efforts,” said Allison Riggs, the group’s senior voting rights attorney. The office of the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina has declined all requests for comment or information this week. Robert Higdon Jr., a Trump appointee, was sworn in as the U.S. attorney for the district in October. Higdon’s office brought charges against 19 non-U.S. citizens for voting illegally in the 2016 presidential election in North Carolina, The News & Observer reported in August. All were charged with voting by a non-citizen, according to Higdon’s office. The foreign nationals countries hailed and from ranged 13 different in age from 26 to 71. President Donald Trump has claimed repeatedly that as many as 5 million people voted illegally in the 2016 election, one reason he says he lost the popular vote to Democrat Hillary Clinton by nearly 2.9 million votes. In May of 2017, Trump issued an executive order to create the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity, a voter fraud task force, to root out the problem. But the commission ran into resistance from states in handing over voter information and was disbanded in January without bringing evidence of widespread voter fraud. North Carolina handed over some of the data the commission requested, according to previous coverage in The News & Observer. The commission asked for the full first, middle and last names of all registered voters, addresses, dates of birth, party affiliations, last four digits of their Social Security numbers and voting history, as well as felony convictions and military status of voters. In June 2017, the state board said it would provide some of the data, but not Social Security numbers, birth dates or driver’s license numbers.. Democratic Rep. G.K. Butterfield, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, said the subpoenas were an attempt to advance President Trump’s anti-immigrant agenda and to suppress voters from minority communities, which typically vote for Democrats. “They’re trying to make a case against immigration reform, they’re trying to make a case to build a wall and I think they’re trying to use it as a technique for voter intimidation. And I think it’s going to transcend beyond the immigrant population. I think it’s intended to target minority groups to find ways to discourage people from voting and to find technical violations that would prevent people from voting, such as change of address,” Butterfield said Thursday.
A Congressional Black Caucus representative called the ICE subpoenas an attempt to advance Trump’s anti-immigrant agenda and suppress minority votes.