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Privacy Watchdog Sues Trump's Election Committee Over Voter Data (engadget.com)
From a report: When the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity sent a letter to all 50 states seeking personal, identifying information on all voters in the US, at least 44 states refused in some part. Trump signed an executive order last May to create this commission while claiming that millions of people had voted illegally. The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) has taken issue with this request, as well, and has filed a lawsuit accusing the Commission of violating the privacy of American voters. EPIC also asserts that the original request asks states to send the data to a non-secure website, making the data vulnerable to identity theft and financial fraud. Not to mention political agendas. EPIC is also seeking information about "the failure to conduct a Privacy Impact Assessment," and has filed for a temporary restraining order "to block the Commission's efforts."
Someone with a suspicious mind might think that these people have something to hide.
RI found 150k+ illegal voters a week or so ago.
Um, no, no they didn't. They found inaccuracies in the registration lists and cleared them away (which happens when they didn't vote for the past 2 elections) or marked them inactive (when election mail is sent back as undeliverable). It's normal and part of maintaining accurate voter rolls. The names cleared didn't actually vote, by definition, you understand that, right?
You fucking losers just hate being wrong, so you lash out, call people names, threaten them and in some cases try to assassinate them. At some point you wankers will either grow up or being wiped off the map. Either way, everyone wins.
I don't know who you should contact for the hypocrite of the year awards, my apologies.
The voter rolls are public information that states may or may not make easy to get. They're normally available to anyone who follows the rules and pays the fee.
Or there's what California does.
The big problem with Voter ID is that many proposals violate the 24th Amendment against poll taxes. A voter ID would need to be free of any financial charge and also free of other logistical barriers, e.g. "you can only get them at the DMV next to the statehouse on odd Tuesdays between the hours of 10 and 11 AM, and you need to provide an in-state birth certificate, social security card, blood sample, passport, pass a citizenship test and submit to a DNA swab".
The New York Times published the exact responses of the elections officials here: https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2017/06/30/us/ap-us-voting-commission-state-responses.html
Almost all of them are along the lines of "we'll gladly turn over the information that our state considers public if the commission just fills out the standard paperwork for requesting it, but we aren't turning over the substantial amount of non-public data the commission is requesting without a court order".
http://www.npr.org/sections/th...
"The letter, sent Wednesday to all 50 states, requests that all publicly available voter roll data be sent to the White House..."
They're asking for otherwise-PUBLICLY AVAILABLE information. They're not asking for secret stuff (why would the states have that anyway?).
Isn't it getting a little tiresome to misinterpret everything Trump does as malignantly as possible?
-Styopa
2. You'll find a lot of dead voters still voting.
Actually, some states have done audits. And they actually found a case of a dead guy voting. Turned out he mailed in his ballot but died before the election, when the votes are counted.
But other than that mildly amusing story, it all pretty much turned into a big nothingburger.
Well, it IS well documented that Trump makes "enemy lists" and follows up on them. So, yes, that is probably exactly what this really is.
...which I happen to think that voter records are something that a federal government could legitimately have reasons to demand accurate and unified data on...
I'm not disagreeing with your overall comment, but some federal governments may legitimately ask for this, but the executive office of the United States of America cannot. The executive branch has no role whatsoever in elections.
Article I, Section 4 of the constitution states:
Section. 4.
Clause 1: The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.
It is up to the states to control elections, Congress can pass laws that can make and alter elections nation wide. The Executive office plays no role. Article 2:
Section. 1. ...
Clause 2: Each State shall appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector.
The states are also in charge of their electors in the electoral college for the President of the United States. The President is not involved. The President should not get involved in the sausage making of the office of the President, as it would be a conflict of interest and cross the boundaries of the balance of power.
The twelfth amendment altered the way the electoral college worked, but it left un-changed the fact that the States, and not the federal government, is in charge of elections.
So it is true that some federal governments may have an interest in this, the federal government of the United States has an extremely limited role. The executive branch has no role in this whatsoever.
The problem is, this is being seen as a blatant attempt by the Trump administration to purge voter rolls of properly registered voters. Unlike Trump's claim of having won the popular vote, this doesn't come out of thin air.
Kris Kobach, the vice-chair of of the Commission of Election Integrity, tried to purge Kansas' voter rolls of 20,000 properly registered voters. He had to be threatened with Contempt of Court before he put them back on the voter rolls.
Then there's Ken Blackwell, another member of the Commission of Election Integrity. During his tenure as Ohio Secretary of State, his office fucked up TWICE, accidentally releasing private data on millions of Ohio voters, including SSNs.
Then there's Hans von Spakovsky, another member of the commission, who, while at the Justice Department promoted voter ID policies in Georgia that would disproportionately affect African-American voters. He had previously published a law review article supporting that policy under a pseudonym, and should have recused himself from the Justice Department decision. He also tried to inject partisan politics into FEC policy during his short time there. And he's no stranger to making wild claims about voter fraud either, claiming that 1400 votes were illegally cast during the 2008 Minnesota Senate election won by Al Franken. (No evidence of this was found.)
Not exactly a stellar cast of characters.
Mr. Hu is not a ninja.
The Democrats didn't raise any sticks about the election itself being hacked, you just made that up.
Please... they screamed it very loudly. They are still screaming it.
In fact, the Democrats were calling the Republicans "unpatriotic" for not blindly believing it.
"His name was James Damore."
"If you've done nothing wrong then you have nothing to fear"
- Words said before every dark chapter in history, ever.
Trump supporters are even dumber than we thought.
No, YOU are dumb. Hell, calling you dumb as a post is an insult to every acorn that dreams of sprouting, growing up, getting cut down, hauled to a sawmill, and getting hewn into a fucking post.
US elections don't even meet UN standards for free and fair elections:
(2) In addition, States should take the necessary policy and institutional steps to ensure the progressive achievement and consolidation of democratic goals, including through the establishment of a neutral, impartial or balanced mechanism for the management of elections. In so doing, they should, among other matters:
- Ensure that those responsible for the various aspects of the election are trained and act impartially, and that coherent voting procedures are established and made known to the voting public;
- Ensure the registration of voters, updating of electoral rolls and balloting procedures, with the assistance of national and international observers as appropriate;
- Encourage parties, candidates and the media to accept and adopt a Code of Conduct to govern the election campaign and the polling period;
- Ensure the integrity of the ballot through appropriate measures to prevent multiple voting or voting by those not entitled thereto;
- Ensure the integrity of the process for counting votes.
(3) States shall respect and ensure the human rights of all individuals within their territory and subject to their jurisdiction. In time of elections, the State and its organs should therefore ensure:
- That freedom of movement, assembly, association and expression are respected, particularly in the context of political rallies and meetings;
- That parties and candidates are free to communicate their views to the electorate, and that they enjoy equality of access to State and public-service media;
- That the necessary steps are taken to guarantee non-partisan coverage in State and public-service media.
The US in general doesn't require positive identification to vote. Try and utter fucking dumbasses like you cry, "YOU'RE A RAAAACIST", apparently because of their own racist beliefs that blacks are too dumb to get a photo id.
Try to even investigate if there is any voter fraud - even though there were precincts in Detroit in the last Presidential election that recorded more votes than registered voters - and you get DUMBASSES calling you names:
Records: Too many votes in 37% of Detroit’s precincts
Voting machines in more than one-third of all Detroit precincts registered more votes than they should have during last month’s presidential election, according to Wayne County records prepared at the request of The Detroit News.
Detailed reports from the office of Wayne County Clerk Cathy Garrett show optical scanners at 248 of the city’s 662 precincts, or 37 percent, tabulated more ballots than the number of voters tallied by workers in the poll books.
But utter dolts like you don't want any investigation into voter fraud?
None of the Project Veritas videos were doctored. Okeefe made the full unedited videos available to the public.
Sure thing. This is from Alabama. This is a list of acceptable photo voter ID that is acceptable. Here is an article about the closure of 29 different county DMV offices. Here is proof that the "mobile ID centers" on make a single stop in each county, and only for two hours at a time. A federal lawsuit will start in September of 2017.
Now, one could claim that it's all due to budget cuts, or such. That it's not some type of voter disenfranchisement plan. Perhaps if this wasn't in Alabama, that might be believable. I'll let you find the numerous citations on Alabama's long history of racism, segregation, and so on...shouldn't take you too long. Hanlon's Razor should always be considered...but when it comes to Alabama and racism, so should Heinlein's Razor:"...but don't rule out malice."