2123 Search Results Containing ":"
Washington Post: GOP push to monitor voting in Texas’s Harris County spurs outcry
Anthony Gutierrez, executive director of the nonpartisan voter education and advocacy group Common Cause Texas, said that while so far there have not been many complaints to his group’s hotline, he is concerned that poll observers could overstep in this year’s tense atmosphere. During a training last week, Gutierrez said volunteers reported seeing people without the required identification circulating at polling locations close to voters. One Black voter complained to the hotline that when he showed up to vote at a polling location at a southwest Dallas community college, a White man outside told him he had to first surrender his cellphone and smartwatch, Gutierrez said. He said the voter complied, cast his ballot and recovered his items, only to discover the man who seized them “was not a worker at that poll site. They were just trying to be intimidating.”
Found in: Common Cause
Associated Press: Musk boosts surge in misinformation about Pelosi attack
Yosef Getachew, director of the media and democracy program at Common Cause, said there’s a significant risk that misinformation spreading so soon before the election could confuse or frighten voters, or lead to more polarization or even acts of violence. “Rather than cave in to conspiracy theorists and propaganda peddlers, we urge Musk to ensure Twitter’s rules and enforcement practices reflect our values of democracy and public safety,” Getachew said.
Found in: Common Cause
Daily Beast: Why Trump Is Ramming Piles of Cash Through a Campaign Loophole
Aaron Scherb, senior director of legislative affairs at Common Cause, said it appears Trump will skate, thanks to historically lax federal enforcement on the question. “Coordination is still certainly illegal here, although the FEC has shown next to no appetite for enforcing coordination rules and laws. There’s not a smoking gun here per se, but it seems like exploitation of a loophole, and three GOP commissioners have shown zero willingness to investigate and enforce existing coordination laws,” Scherb said. “Until they do, special interests and dark money groups will continue to exploit loopholes at the expense of everyday voters.”
Found in: Common Cause
HuffPost: The 2022 Election Nightmare Has Already Started
“We were saying, in Pennsylvania you have to pass something to deal with pre-processing,” said Sylvia Albert, director of voting and elections for Common Cause, a nonprofit active in monitoring elections. “To me, at this point, it is purposeful. They want chaos. If you refuse to pass laws, you are asking for what’s next.” ... The lies Republicans spread about the post-election vote count highlight a mostly overlooked aspect of elections: that they do not end on Election Day. Ballots must be processed, counted, canvassed and certified. When elections are extremely close, recounts may be in order depending on each state’s recount laws. “In the past, election protection broadly has been about focusing on how we are preparing up to the election ― the day before and the day of the election,” said Quentin Turner, director of Common Cause Michigan. “But in the past couple years, that has changed. The days leading up to and on Election Day are the pregame. The work continues on in just as an intense way after the election. And that is where the most opportunities are for people who want to sow discord or doubt in the process.”
Found in: Common Cause
Reuters: With U.S. midterms ahead, Musk's Twitter takeover raises fear of misinformation wave
"(Musk's acquisition) could certainly create a much bigger pathway for disinformation agents to spread harmful information on the platform," said Yosef Getachew, the director of the media and democracy program at Common Cause, the nonpartisan public interest organization. "Content moderation policies are only effective if there are people there to enforce them and systems in place to ensure they are being enforced. If those rules are going to be out the window, that is going to be incredibly harmful."
Found in: Common Cause
Inside Sources/Tribune News Service (Op-Ed): MAGA Republicans Plot to Nationalize Voter Suppression
Although significant attention has focused on the more than 400 anti-voter bills introduced (several dozen of which have become law) in state legislatures since the insurrection, some federal bills also portend a dangerous trend. Congressional Republicans have introduced more than 30 anti-voter bills since the insurrection that have largely gone unnoticed. These anti-voter bills telegraph what congressional MAGA Republicans would like to do: make it harder for certain Americans to vote.
Found in: Common Cause
New York Times: Running Against Hochul, Lee Zeldin Finds Another Target: Alvin Bragg
Mr. Zeldin’s pledge to push him out “is an authoritarian move,” said Susan Lerner, the executive director of Common Cause New York, a good government advocacy group. “If the voters recall a D.A., that’s the will of the voters. But for some other entity to override the will of the voters is antithetical to our system of governance.”
Found in: Common Cause
New Report: Extremists’ Plot to Nationalize Voter Suppression: 2023 and Beyond
A new report from Common Cause, “Extremists’ Plot to Nationalize Voter Suppression: 2023 and Beyond,” examines a new wave of anti-voter bills that have been introduced by Republicans in Congress representing an attempt to nationalize voter suppression. These extremist bills have largely been ignored by the public and the media, but should Republicans gain control of the U.S. House or Senate, these bills would represent a serious threat to the freedom to vote for millions of Americans.
Found in: Common Cause
Bloomberg: Masked poll watchers are showing up at voting sites with handguns and Kevlar vests
“Ballot drop boxes are open for much longer than polling places. They aren’t staffed and they are often placed in locations that make them vulnerable for people to act in a way that you would probably not see in a polling place,” said Suzanne Almeida, who is heading a voter intimidation hotline for the advocacy group Common Cause.
Found in: Common Cause
MEDIA ADVISORY: Common Cause, SCJS Hold Media Briefing on Legal Strategy for Moore v. Harper
On Thursday, October 27 at 1 p.m. EST, Common Cause and the Southern Coalition for Social Justice will hold a media briefing to discuss the legal arguments and strategy behind the fight to defend our democracy in Moore v. Harper.