Voting & Elections

Susan Lerner, the executive director of the civic watchdog group Common Cause New York and a proponent of all three initiatives, argued that the success of Republican and Conservative attacks highlighted the fragility of democracy itself. “There was a strong anti-democratic push and the pro-democracy folks stayed home,” she said. Finally, as written, the ballot questions, which required voters to flip their ballots over to weigh in, were hard to understand, according to Common Cause and like-minded groups. “The ballot language for 1, 3, and 4 was frankly impenetrable,” Ms. Lerner said of the three measures that went down to defeat.

Common Cause is urging every member of the U.S. Senate to vote to begin debate on the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act when the Senate considers the legislation later this week. The letter, sent today to every Senator, emphasizes that already this year, 19 states have enacted 33 restrictive voting laws that make it harder for Americans – particularly Black and Brown voters - to have a say in choosing their elected leaders. The letter also notes that Common Cause plans to key-vote this legislation in our Democracy Scorecard, which we send to our 1.5 million members.

It’s time for congressional Republicans to learn from the states, listen to the voters and find their way back to the principle of a government “by the people.” Our generation has a responsibility to add our own chapter to the unfolding story of freedom. It’s beyond time for Senate Republicans to advance the Freedom to Vote Act. If they don’t, Senate Democrats must reform the filibuster to protect our sacred freedom to vote.

“We have also seen and documented the social media companies’ failures in their public commitment to prevent the spread of disinformation about elections – failures echoed by Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen,” said Jesse Littlewood, Common Cause Vice President for Campaigns and one of the authors of the report. “The current state of affairs is nothing short of dangerous and the time is now for comprehensive reforms.”

With The Facebook Papers adding daily to the evidence of the inability and unwillingness of social media giants to combat disinformation and other harmful content, Common Cause today released an extensive report on election disinformation, including a comprehensive set of reforms needed to curb this huge and growing problem and protect our right to vote in elections next week, next year, and beyond. Based on more than 15,000 hours monitoring social media in the 2020 election cycle, together with legal and policy expertise, “As a Matter of Fact: The Harms Caused by Election Disinformation” details the seriousness and scale of the threat, current applicable state and federal laws, and the woefully inadequate and inconsistent civic integrity policies of the social media giants. The report concludes with a sweeping series of reform recommendations to better enable us to fight back against election disinformation.

“In what world does it make sense to appoint someone who took an active role to discredit the will of voters?” said Stephanie Gomez, associate director of Common Cause Texas.