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Associated Press: Advocates warn House rule change could undermine voters
As lawmakers prepare to debate bills on abortion access, LGBTQ rights and immigration, Miles Beasley, a Historically Black Colleges and Universities fellow at Common Cause North Carolina, said he worries the rule could be abused to further disadvantage vulnerable communities. “These surprise votes rob us of our right to speak to our representatives before important votes happen, cutting us out of the lawmaking process,” said Beasley, a student at Saint Augustine’s University in Raleigh. He urged House Republicans not to resort to “petty power plays” when they vote on permanent rules in the coming weeks.
Found in: Common Cause
Roll Call: McCarthy names GOP members to House Ethics Committee
“The appointment of Rep. Andrew Garbarino (R-NY) to the House Ethics Committee is especially revealing,” said Aaron Scherb, a senior director of legislative affairs at Common Cause, in an email to CQ Roll Call. “When the committee is investigating Rep. George Santos’ numerous lies, fabrications, and significant ethical lapses, a reasonable observer could call into question the ability of Rep. Garbarino to be an objective investigator.”
Found in: Common Cause
TV Tech: Common Cause Calls on Senate to Confirm Gigi Sohn to FCC
Common Cause has issued a strongly worded plea for the U.S. Senate to confirm Gigi Sohn as a new commissioner to the FCC, saying that “in recent weeks, industry and big money opposition have continued to run a smear campaign to stall Gigi Sohn’s confirmation to serve as FCC commissioner. These attacks have now turned to a more bigoted and hateful nature in an effort to keep the FCC deadlocked. A deadlocked FCC is unable to advance key priorities that address the communications needs of all households. Common Cause calls on the Senate to condemn these attacks and rapidly confirm her to the FCC.” “It is disgraceful that the FCC has been forced into deadlock since the beginning of the Biden administration while big money opposition continues to run a sleazy and bigoted campaign to stall Ms. Sohn’s confirmation,” added Michael Copps, former FCC commissioner and Common Cause special adviser in a statement to the press. “Industry gatekeepers will go to any lengths to smear Ms. Sohn’s name, all to derail her confirmation because they know a fully functional FCC will hold them accountable for engaging in anti-consumer practices.” “Ms. Sohn is more than qualified to be a commissioner and has spent her entire career fighting for the public interest – the core mission of the FCC,” Copps said. “She has the support of nearly 250 organizations including groups from across the political spectrum. We urge the senate to condemn the continued smear campaign against Ms. Sohn and quickly confirm her to the FCC.”
Found in: Common Cause
Associated Press: Group: N.C. request for redistricting rehearing ‘frivolous’
Hilary Klein, an attorney for Common Cause, wrote that the rehearing petition is “frivolous.” She referred specifically to House Speaker Tim Moore’s public statement that another look at the cases was needed because the “people of North Carolina sent a message election day” to reject the ruling of the “outgoing (judicial) majority.” The petition “is therefore motivated by improper purpose and grossly lacking in the requirements of propriety,” Klein wrote.
Found in: Common Cause
Plain Dealer/Cleveland.com: Corporate jets, bribes and dark money: Householder trial spotlights weaknesses in Ohio ethics laws
Catherine Turcer, executive director of the good-government group Common Cause Ohio, said it’s “astonishing” that lawmakers have yet to take up any reforms in response to the Householder scandal. “It’s clear to me that the people in power like the structure that we have right now, and that they’re benefitting from the lack of transparency,” Turcer said. ... Turcer said there’s a public interest in limiting lawmakers’ and other politicians’ ability to accept trips on private jets. “Any time our lawmakers are given perks from folks who want something, it’s a problem if our goal is reducing quid pro quo,” Turcer said. ... Turcer, the good-government advocate, said a lack of transparency in political spending is the core issue behind the abuses revealed by the House Bill 6 scandal. She said campaign-finance laws won’t prevent future scandals. But they could discourage them, she said. “I look at them like guardrails,” Turcer said. “If we have a speed limit that’s 55, 65, 70. You have people who might go 72. They might even go 80. But they aren’t going 120.”
Found in: Common Cause
Salon: "Groyper" guru Nick Fuentes returns to Twitter (briefly): Hateful content keeps flowing
Yosef Getachew, a media and democracy program director at Common Cause, said allowing a blatantly bigoted and disruptive user like Fuentes back on Twitter sends a clear signal that the platform is failing to enforce its own policies, he added. "You're creating an environment where users may feel threatened, harassed or attacked, or you could be inciting others to engage in offline violence," Getachew said. "That's essentially how the [Jan. 6] insurrection started, given that millions of users were exposed to harmful content and were asked to organize and mobilize offline to try and overthrow our government. It's the same type of pattern." "There are reports out there that these groups are organizing, that they're harassing individuals, that they're building momentum," Getachew said. "A lot of times, those kinds of things are not taken into account. Platforms are just looking to see what's going on in this particular moment, rather than the bigger picture."
Found in: Common Cause
Pennsylvania Capital-Star: Looking to solve a Harrisburg problem, Pa. House Speaker Rozzi turns to Pittsburgh for advice
Khalif Ali, executive director of the good government group Common Cause Pennsylvania, told Rozzi his organization is concerned about the way legislators have attempted to use amendments to the state constitution. “The constitutional amendment process was never meant to be used as a means to advance vetoed and failed legislation, or to punish the court for decisions that weren’t favorable to a party’s agenda,” Ali said. He pointed to Senate Bill 106, a multi-pronged constitutional amendment package, passed by the General Assembly last year, that seeks to, among other things, change the state constitution to say there was no constitutional right to an abortion in Pennsylvania. It amounted to “a deliberate move to leverage a very sensitive issue to advance a political agenda,” Ali said. “We’ve gotten to a point where some elected officials are spending much more time finding loopholes in the system than moving towards a democracy that works for everyone and collectively solving our pressing societal issues,” he added. “What worries me the most is the fact that we’re getting dangerously close to normalizing this behavior. This listening tour is happening at the exact right time and depending on how the information is used, it could establish a basis for fixing a broken Harrisburg,” Ali continued.
Found in: Common Cause
Tampa Bay Times: Tampa election first locally to test new absentee ballot law
“Tampa is a huge city. A major city and it’s one of the first (to deal with the new law),” said Amy Keith, program director for Common Cause Florida, a branch of the national voting rights and government accountability organization. The extra step required to request a mail ballot for each election makes accessing a ballot harder, especially for the disabled, elderly, working poor and other groups, Keith said. “It makes it harder to participate, for people to have their voice heard and have a say,” Keith said. In the November election, one-third of Florida voters cast their ballots by mail, she said.
Found in: Common Cause
Texas Tribune/Houston Chronicle: Two years after Texas’ voting rights showdown gripped the nation, lawmakers again push dozens of elections bills
“Looking back over the past few legislative sessions, there have been repeated attempts to find creative ways to prosecute people for what really looks like an honest mistake,” said Anthony Gutierrez, executive director of Common Cause Texas, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for policies such as online voting registration and ending gerrymandering. “There’s no infrastructure to tell people what the process is for when you can vote again [after release from prison] or how you can vote again.”