2128 Search Results Containing ":"
Yahoo! News/Texas Tribune: Most 18-year-old Texans aren’t signed up to vote despite a law requiring voter registration in high schools
Katya Ehresman, voting rights program manager at Common Cause Texas, noted that some states reward schools that register students. Tennessee acknowledges schools that reach a certain voter registration threshold, and Pennsylvania has a governor’s civic engagement award to celebrate schools that register 85% of eligible students to vote, for example. Common Cause also recommends that the secretary of state’s office mail each school voter registration applications, instead of requiring schools to request them twice a year.
Found in: Common Cause
Cleveland.com/The Plain Dealer: FirstEnergy made secret $1 million payment for ‘Husted campaign’ in 2017, documents show
Catherine Turcer, executive director of Common Cause Ohio, said the records showing the payment is another example of why Ohio needs greater transparency in political spending. We're still learning about public officials proximity to a bribery scandal after years of a swarm of criminal, civil, and regulatory investigations, she said. The complicated picture is a feature and not a bug, she said. The system is built to hide malfeasance. "What we do know from this is the governor and lieutenant governor are very comfortable in a dark money system and figured out how to maximize the loophole in transparency to benefit themselves, their friends, and their family," she said. "The governor and lieutenant governor have figured out a way to make dark money work for them."
Found in: Common Cause
Washington Times: Defendants not named ‘Trump’ usually go to trial years after indictment
Meanwhile, the fair election advocacy group Common Cause filed a brief supporting Mr. Smith at the Supreme Court in the D.C. case over Mr. Trump's claim of absolute immunity, saying the justices must decide the issue swiftly so the trial can take place before the November election and, ironically, so politics don't appear to be at play. "The American people deserve a trial and a verdict on these serious charges before they go to the polls in November," said Virginia Kase Solomón, president of Common Cause. "The presumptive Republican presidential nominee stands criminally charged with conspiracy and obstruction stemming from his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. It is critically important that the Supreme Court rule quickly, as it has in past presidential cases, so that justice can be rendered before Americans cast their ballots."
Found in: Common Cause
PolitiFact: FALSE: Texas found that 95,000 noncitizens were registered to vote.
"For those of us who’ve worked in Texas politics for years, it was a huge deal because you almost never see a gubernatorial appointee fail to get confirmed by the state senate," Anthony Gutierrez, executive director of Common Cause Texas, a voting advocacy group, told PolitiFact. "It goes to show just how wildly false their claim of 95,000 non-citizens being on the voter rolls was that it resulted in the Republican-dominated Texas Legislature refusing to confirm the nomination of the Republican governor."
Found in: Common Cause
Salon/Yahoo! News: Rebooting digital equality: FCC to restore net neutrality, reversing Trump-era repeal
Government watchdog group Common Cause has long championed net neutrality protections, arguing that the rules protect the public's right to the equal access of publicly-funded internet infrastructure. “The internet is a gateway to democracy for many and every voter has the right to a free and fair internet. From looking up information about candidates to finding polling sites, this net neutrality proposal will make it easier for every voter to participate in our modern democracy. We strongly encourage the FCC to restore net neutrality and return control of the internet to the people. Especially in a major election year, the FCC must do all it can to protect every voter’s right to basic information online," said Ishan Mehta, director of Common Cause's Media & Democracy Program, in an emailed statement Wednesday.
Found in: Common Cause
Washington Post: Nebraska lawmakers vote against Trump-fueled push to change electoral vote system
“Until yesterday, this wasn’t a discussion at all, and then suddenly it blew up, and several of our legislators that are process-oriented will take a skeptical line,” said Gavin Geis, executive director of Common Cause Nebraska.
Found in: Common Cause
Star Tribune/Yahoo! News: 'Book Senator Hoffman to speak': DFL state senator's consulting firm raises ethical questions
Annastacia Belladonna-Carrera, executive director of Common Cause Minnesota, a nonprofit that advocates for government transparency, also had concerns. She said, "Sen. Hoffman's use of this title for marketing his consulting business as 'senator', along with the use of pictures taken while at the Capitol campus, can arguably be seen as him leveraging his public role for private gain." Belladonna-Carrera suggested the legislative branch could benefit from having clearer rules for lawmakers. "This branch of government — I would argue the most public facing and accountable to the people particularly because of what it does and who it is supposed to be working for — is once again the one with the least accountability and transparency," she said.
Found in: Common Cause
NBC News: Wisconsin voters approve two GOP-backed ballot measures that will change how elections are run
“In the April elections Wisconsin tends to have low turnout, and not many people are going to look at these [closely]. Maybe they’ll read it and think, ‘yeah, that sounds reasonable,’” Jay Heck, the executive director of Common Cause Wisconsin, the state’s branch of the national nonpartisan government watchdog group, said ahead of the results. “But they are both the product of election denial.” Their impact could be notable, Heck suggested. With avenues for additional funding roped off, and with the scope of who can volunteer as poll workers narrowed, the possibility of additional conspiracy theories and chaos during and following another close race this fall — the state’s past two presidential elections were both decided by fewer than 23,000 votes — could be more likely. “Unless the Legislature fully funds election administration, which the Republican-controlled Legislature never has done and never will do, then this leaves election clerks all over the state of Wisconsin without the resources to run elections” well, he said.
Found in: Common Cause
CBS/Associated Press: Writing the wrong date on your mail-in ballot in Pa. could get your vote thrown out, judges rule
Common Cause Pennsylvania issued this statement about the ruling: "This ruling means that counties will be permitted to throw out ballots that were submitted in time, for reasons irrelevant to the voters' eligibility to vote. We are disheartened by this ruling and maintain our position that every voter who makes the effort to participate should have their vote counted. But our work will continue regardless. Though this ruling will undoubtedly have a negative impact on elderly voters and voters of color, we will work with partners to ensure that voters across the state of Pennsylvania know how to make sure their votes are counted."
Found in: Common Cause
Miami Herald/Orlando Sentinel (Editorial): Lawmakers make it easier for corruption to flourish
Common Cause Florida and eight other groups are urging DeSantis to veto the bill, calling the personal knowledge standard “an unreasonably high evidentiary hurdle that has never existed in the 50-year history of the Commission. Instead, complaints should continue to require the filer to certify that the information is true to the best of their knowledge, which already discourages false and frivolous complaints.”