‘We have a project’: QAnon followers eye swing state election official races | Ed Pilkington/The Guardian

QAnon, the extremist conspiracy movement whose followers believe Donald Trump is waging war against the “deep state”, appears to have instigated a nationwide effort to take control of the US election process in critical battleground states ahead of America’s 2024 presidential election. In recent months concern has risen over the coordinated efforts of at least 15 candidates – committed to Trump’s “big lie” that the 2020 election was stolen from him – who are now running to serve as chief election officials in key swing states. At least eight of the candidates standing for secretary of state positions have formed an alliance in which they share tactics and tips for success, details of which the Guardian revealed last month. Should any of the candidates be elected, they would be in prime position to distort or even overturn election results in favor of Trump or another preferred presidential candidate in ways that could have a profound impact on or even determine the national outcome. All the big lie candidates vying to gain control of election counts at state level present themselves as Republicans. It is now emerging that QAnon played a critical role in steering far-right candidates towards the secretary of state races as part of what appears to be a calculated nationwide assault on American democracy.

Full Article: ‘We have a project’: QAnon followers eye swing state election official races | QAnon | The Guardian

National: Senators Look to Fix 1887 Electoral Act Putting U.S. Democracy at Risk | Blake Hounshell and Leah Askarinam/The New York Times

The Electoral Count Act is both a legal monstrosity and a fascinating puzzle. Intended to settle disputes about how America chooses its presidents, the 135-year-old law has arguably done the opposite. Last year, its poorly written and ambiguous text tempted Donald Trump into trying to overturn Joe Biden’s victory, using a fringe legal theory that his own vice president rejected. Scholars say the law remains a ticking time bomb. And with Trump on their minds, members of Congress in both parties now agree that fixing it before the 2024 election is a matter of national urgency. “If people don’t trust elections as a fair way to transition power, then what are you left with?” said Senator Angus King, an independent from Maine who has been leading the reform efforts. “I would argue that Jan. 6 is a harbinger.”

Full Article: Senators Look to Fix 1887 Electoral Act Putting U.S. Democracy at Risk – The New York Times

National: State election officials survived Trump’s attacks. Will they survive the ballot box? | Arit John/Los Angeles Times

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and her 4-year-old son were settling in to watch “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” after putting up Christmas decorations when dozens of protesters descended on her home in December 2020 chanting “Stop the Steal” and “We want an audit.” Benson had been on the radar of President Trump and his allies since the spring, when he railed against her decision to send absentee ballot applications to all Michigan voters, calling her a “rogue Secretary.” But the late-night protest, marked by what she described at the time as “armed individuals shouting obscenities,” solidified her role as a central figure in the fight over control of American elections. The stakes have increased heading into the 2022 midterm elections. Democratic groups, donors and incumbents like Benson have raised record amounts to secure seats in battleground states, while Trump loyalists are running on his unfounded election fraud claims, challenging Democrats and Republicans like Georgia’s Brad Raffensperger in their bids to administer elections and sign off on the results. “Secretaries of state are, in the battle over the future of our democracy, serving on the front lines,” said Benson, who is expected to soon announce her reelection plans, in an interview with The Times. “[C]learly the work that we did to successfully defend democracy in 2020 has placed us in a greater spotlight.”

Full Article: Secretaries of states are front and center in 2022 midterms – Los Angeles Times

National: State Legislators Ramp Up Push for Election Control | Carl Smith/Governing

According to a January 2022 NPR/Ipsos poll, seven in 10 Americans believe that the U.S. is in crisis, even at risk of failing. Unproven claims that fraud tainted the 2020 election, still being repeated even by government officials, are a driving force behind these fears. State legislators from both parties have aggressively pushed election reform, introducing a record number of bills relating to matters including registration, voting by mail, voter ID and drop boxes. Moving beyond this, some Republican lawmakers have introduced bills that could give legislatures more power to decide election outcomes. “We see legislation and legislative reaction after every big election,” says Tammy Patrick, senior adviser to the elections program at Democracy Fund. “But the process is morphing in a way because it’s taking on additional topics that are greatly gaining traction that they never would’ve gotten in the past.” One of the bills that has attracted the most attention, Arizona HB 2596, would give the Legislature power to accept or reject election results. In the event of a rejection, “any qualified elector” would be able to file an action in a superior court to request a new election.

Full Article: State Legislators Ramp Up Push for Election Control

National: Right-wing conspiracy theories target tool that fights actual voter fraud | Miles Parks/NPR

If Republicans over the past few years have made one thing clear, it’s that they really care about voter fraud. Sometimes they call it “election irregularities” or “shenanigans,” but the issue has become a calling card for a party whose voters by and large falsely think elections in the U.S. are tainted. Which is what makes a currently blossoming election conspiracy so strange: The far right is now running a disinformation campaign against one of the best tools that states have to detect and prevent voter fraud. And experts worry voting policy is already starting to suffer as a result. The tool is a shared database called the Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC for short. It allows states to securely share voter registration data across state lines and with a number of other government agencies, like the Social Security Administration and departments of motor vehicles. That data-sharing allows participating states to expand ballot access by giving officials information that helps them reach out to eligible voters who have moved into the jurisdiction but have not yet registered to vote. But it also increases election security by notifying those same officials when a registered voter moves away or dies, allowing states to maintain more accurate voter rolls. “When you move away from a state, you don’t call your old state and say, ‘Please take me off the voter lists,’ ” said David Becker, an elections expert and former Justice Department attorney who led the development of ERIC while working at the Pew Charitable Trusts. “So to get really strong data that someone moved to another state — got a driver’s license there or maybe registered to vote — that’s really powerful information that allows states to keep their data up to date.”

Full Article: Right-wing conspiracy theories target tool that fights actual voter fraud : NPR

National: G.O.P. Declares Jan. 6 Attack ‘Legitimate Political Discourse’ | Jonathan Weisman and Reid J. Epstein/The New York Times

The Republican Party on Friday officially declared the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and events that led to it “legitimate political discourse,” and rebuked two lawmakers in the party who have been most outspoken in condemning the deadly riot and the role of Donald J. Trump in spreading the election lies that fueled it. The Republican National Committee’s voice vote to censure Representatives Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois at its winter meeting in Salt Lake City culminated more than a year of vacillation, which started with party leaders condemning the Capitol attack and Mr. Trump’s conduct, then shifted to downplaying and denying it. On Friday, the party went further in a resolution slamming Ms. Cheney and Mr. Kinzinger for taking part in the House investigation of the assault, saying they were participating in “persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.” After the vote, party leaders rushed to clarify that language, saying it was never meant to apply to rioters who violently stormed the Capitol in Mr. Trump’s name. “Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger crossed a line,” Ronna McDaniel, the Republican National Committee chairwoman, said in a statement. “They chose to join Nancy Pelosi in a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens who engaged in legitimate political discourse that had nothing to do with violence at the Capitol.”

Full Article: G.O.P. Declares Jan. 6 Attack ‘Legitimate Political Discourse’ – The New York Times

Editorial: How Liz Cheney could force voters to defend our foundational principles | Barney Frank/The Washington Post

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and the Democratic leadership have already done American democracy a major service by their mutually respectful cooperation in investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection. Their demonstration that political leaders can jointly defend foundational principles while differing sharply on other issues is invaluable. It could also be the basis for a great opportunity for American voters: the chance to express their support for the integrity of the democratic process regardless of their views on any other questions. This can be accomplished with a two-step process. First, Cheney runs for reelection, not in the primary to become the official Republican nominee but as a principled independent in the general election who retains her personal Republican allegiance. Second, Wyoming Democrats do not support a candidate to oppose her. The result would be a November contest in which all citizens of Wyoming could choose between two candidates who are aligned on the broad range of public policy issues and differ largely on the question of Donald Trump’s assault on the electoral process. Cheney can make clear that if elected, she will not vote for a Democratic speaker or change her position on any substantive questions. This will make it possible for other Republican leaders who share her principled commitment to campaign for her even though she is not the official nominee.

Full Article: Opinion | How Liz Cheney could force voters to defend our foundational principles – The Washington Post

Arizona Senate Republicans push bills to combat ‘voter fraud’ | Michael McDaniel/Courthouse News Service

An Arizona Senate committee voted Thursday to advance election reform bills that would prohibit the use of drop boxes and add a precinct tallying requirement prior to county tallying. Senator Wendy Rogers, a Republican from Flagstaff, presented Senate Bills 1058 and 1343 to the Senate Government Committee. “I’m Senator Rogers, I’m the sponsor of this bill,” Rogers said of Senate Bill 1058. “This is basically no more drop boxes. Over.” The former Air Force pilot’s comments were met with applause and laughter from the majority-conservative gallery. The chairwoman reminded the crowd that they must observe decorum in the reading or be excused from the proceedings. The committee took comments from the public, with few dissenters of the bills. One dissenter felt the bills could sway voter engagement. “I’m concerned about this and the other bills regulating voting because new restrictions on voting will have the effect of disenfranchising voters who may feel they can’t meet the challenges, and for no valid reason,” said Judith Simon, who has worked as a teacher for 33 years. “I’m thinking of voters in rural and tribal areas, [and] disabled and elderly voters, who may not read all the particular legal details and just hear, ‘Oh, we can’t use drop boxes at all anymore.’”

Full Article: Arizona Senate Republicans push bills to combat ‘voter fraud’ | Courthouse News Service

Georgia: Investigation undercuts claim that 1,000 people voted twice | Mark Niesse/The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

After the hectic 2020 Georgia primary, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger made a bombshell allegation from the steps of Liberty Plaza outside the Georgia Capitol that 1,000 people potentially voted twice. A year and a half later, an investigation by his own office has found less double voting than he had suspected. Most of Raffensperger’s allegation couldn’t be proved, the latest claim of voting fraud surrounding the 2020 election that fell short under scrutiny. Unlike former President Donald Trump’s false claims about his election being stolen, investigators validated some of Raffensperger’s assertions of double voting. The secretary of state’s office disclosed preliminary findings of its double voting investigation in response to requests by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The investigation so far indicates about 300 voters cast two ballots in the June 2020 primary and August 2020 primary runoff, almost always because of mistakes by confused voters and poll workers. The number of double voters could rise because about 100 cases remain under investigation.

Full Article: Investigation undercuts claim that 1,000 people voted twice in Georgia

Idaho Senate committee approves post-election audits bill | Kelcie Moseley-Morris/Idaho Capital Sun

The Senate State Affairs Committee advanced two bills Wednesday morning related to the Idaho Secretary of State’s office, including a new law that would require post-election audits of a random selection of counties after a general or primary election. Senate Bill 1274 was introduced to the committee by Deputy Secretary of State Jason Hancock, who said the audits would increase public confidence in election results, and it’s a practice that many states have already implemented. “We take election integrity very seriously at the Secretary of State’s office, we take allegations of election insecurity very seriously, and … we have a lot of people right now who think we have problems with our election system,” Hancock said. Following the presidential election in 2020, former President Donald Trump and his supporters have alleged voter fraud and other conspiracies they say led to President Joe Biden’s electoral victory. Ten Idaho legislators signed a letter in October calling for a 50-state audit of the election results. Election results have been audited in several states, including Idaho, and no fraud has been found. Under the new bill, the audits would be open to attendance by media personnel, candidates and representatives from political parties. The exact procedures for the audits would be developed with county clerks, according to the bill text.

Full Article: Idaho Senate committee approves post-election audits bill – Idaho Capital Sun

Michigan Secretary of State asks for probe into voting machine access in Roscommon County | Craig Mauger/The Detroit News

Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson is asking the Attorney General’s office and the Michigan State Police to investigate reports that an “unnamed third party” was granted access to voting technology in Roscommon County. Benson, the state’s top election official, announced the request in a statement Thursday. She also sent a letter to clerks across the state, saying Michigan law is “clear that unauthorized third parties may not have access to election technology and data.” “Our office has recently received multiple credible allegations of instances in which an unauthorized third party has been granted access to vote tabulation machines in violation of Michigan law,” Benson’s letter began. At least one third party allegedly gained inappropriate access to tabulation machines and data drives used in Richfield Township and Roscommon County, according to the Secretary of State’s office. Such access could require the equipment to be replaced at taxpayer expense, the office said. Roscommon County Clerk Michelle Stevenson and Richfield Township Clerk Greg Watt didn’t respond Thursday evening to requests for comment. Richfield Township Supervisor John Bawol said he didn’t know what Benson’s statement was referring to. Contracts with voting system vendors and state law restrict access to voting equipment to qualified personnel, the secretary of state’s statement said.

Full Article: Benson asks for probe into voting machine access in Roscommon County

Michigan: Unplugging voting machines is illegal. Clerks say GOP candidate is promoting election crime. | Malachi Barrett/MLive.com

Unplugging a voting machine is unlikely to do anything more than land you in jail. At a Jan. 26 event in Macomb County, Republican gubernatorial candidate Ryan Kelley encouraged poll workers to unplug election equipment if they suspect something suspicious is occurring. Kelley gave the same advice to a group in Livingston County three days later, urging the crowd to unplug voting machines “if you see something you don’t like happening.” Interfering with a voting device is illegal. It’s also not likely to have any impact on election results. Voting tabulators have backup batteries that can provide power for hours in case of electrical outages. Paper ballots are later tabulated by local canvassing boards anyway, so shutting down machines used to automate the process on election day wouldn’t affect results. “It’s just unfortunate that people who are aspiring to be public servants are encouraging that kind of stuff,” said Macomb County Clerk Anthony Forlini. “We all want to uphold the law, we all want to be stewards of society as a whole and do the right thing. Maybe these people are thinking that is the right thing, but it’s not.”

Full Article: Unplugging voting machines is illegal. Clerks say GOP candidate is promoting election crime. – mlive.com

Michigan: Giuliani asked prosecutor to give voting machines to Trump team | Jon Swaine, Emma Brown and Jacqueline Alemany/The Washington Post

In the weeks after the 2020 election, Rudolph W. Giuliani and other legal advisers to President Donald Trump asked a Republican prosecutor in northern Michigan to get his county’s voting machines and pass them to Trump’s team, the prosecutor told The Washington Post. Antrim County prosecutor James Rossiter said in an interview that Giuliani and several colleagues made the request during a telephone call after the county initially misreported its election results. The inaccurate tallies meant that Joe Biden appeared to have beaten Trump by 3,000 votes in a Republican stronghold, an error that soon placed Antrim at the center of false claims by Trump that the election had been stolen. Rossiter said he declined. “I said, ‘I can’t just say: give them here.’ We don’t have that magical power to just demand things as prosecutors. You need probable cause.” Even if he had had sufficient grounds to take the machines as evidence, Rossiter said, he could not have released them to outsiders or a party with an interest in the matter. Legal scholars said it was unusual and inappropriate for a president’s representatives to make such a request of a local prosecutor. “I never expected in my life I’d get a call like this,” Rossiter said. Giuliani declined to comment in response to questions from The Post, his attorney said. Giuliani’s team called Rossiter around Nov. 20, 2020, Rossiter said, as it worked to overturn Trump’s defeat to Biden. The direct appeal to a local law enforcement official was part of a broader effort by Trump’s allies to access voting machines in an attempt to prove that the election had been stolen. That effort extended to a recently disclosed draft executive order for Trump’s signature to have National Guard troops seize machines across the nation.

Full Article: Giuliani asked Michigan prosecutor to give voting machines to Trump team – The Washington Post

Nevada lawmakers approve another $2.2 million to improve mostly mail elections | Riley Snyder/The Nevada Independent

Nevada legislators have approved spending another $2.2 million to facilitate Nevada’s switch to a largely vote-by-mail state ahead of the 2022 election, pushing the total cost north of $14 million. The funding request, passed unanimously by members of the Interim Finance Committee on Wednesday, comes from the secretary of state’s office and was described by Deputy Secretary of State for Elections Mark Wlaschin as the list of necessities to successfully implement new mail voting requirements for the 2022 election. “There were certainly some nice-to-haves that we had discussed that may come further on down the line, but this request, specifically, [are] the essentials for the 2022 election cycle based on input from all 17 of the counties,” he said during the meeting. The additional funding comes on top of $12.2 million already allocated by lawmakers last year as part of AB321, the bill implementing the move to permanent, expanded mail voting. Under the law, which was opposed by all legislative Republicans, every active registered voter will be sent a mail ballot before a primary or general election. Inactive voters, who are legally registered to vote but don’t have a current address on file with election officials, will not be sent a mail ballot.

Full Article: Lawmakers approve another $2.2 million to improve mostly mail elections – The Nevada Independent

Tennessee: Legal experts baffled by sentencing of woman for registering to vote | Associated Press

Some legal experts view as excessive and baffling the six-year prison sentence given to a Tennessee activist convicted of illegally registering to vote while on probation. Pamela Moses was convicted in November and sentenced to six years and a day on Jan. 31 by Shelby County Criminal Court Judge W. Mark Ward. The judge told Moses that he would consider placing her on probation after nine months if she completes certain prison programs and maintains good behavior, the district attorney’s office in Memphis said in a news release. Moses, who is Black, was convicted of multiple felonies and placed on probation in 2015, but she thought she was eligible to vote and tried to register in 2019. Some legal experts say the sentence illustrates the depth of the challenges faced by convicted felons when they try to have their voting rights restored and pointing out racial factors involved in the case. David Becker, a former attorney in the voting section of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, said there is a movement among both conservatives and liberals to change “punitive and restrictive laws” that effectively disenfranchise people who have committed felonies but are not incarcerated and seek to return to society by exercising their right to vote. Many states are moving toward extending voter eligibility to such people, he said.

Full Article: Legal experts baffled by sentence for registering to vote | AP News

Texas: Hundreds of mail-in ballots are being returned to voters because they don’t comply with new voting law | Alexa Ura/The Texas Tribune

Stricter voting rules enacted by Republican lawmakers last year continue to foil Texans trying to vote by mail in the upcoming primary, with hundreds of completed ballots being initially rejected for not meeting the state’s new identification requirements. The bulk of mail-in ballots have yet to arrive at elections offices, but local officials are already reporting that a significant number are coming in without the newly required ID information. As of Wednesday, election officials in Harris County alone had flagged 1,360 mail-in ballots to be sent back to voters — 40% of the mail-in ballots returned up to that point — because they lacked an ID number. Under the state’s new rules, officials cannot accept ballots without the ID information on the return envelopes containing the ballot and must mail them back if there’s enough time for the voter to send back a corrected envelope. “We’ll see how many we get back,” said Isabel Longoria, the Harris County elections administrator. “That’s our big question mark right now: Are voters going to go through the extra step to correct it?” The new ID requirements are the earliest rule changes to kick in under the law that Republican lawmakers enacted last year to further tighten voting procedures in the state. The law, known as SB 1, ratchets up the state’s already strict rules for voting by mail by requiring absentee voters to include a state identification number like a driver’s license number, or — if they don’t have a driver’s license — a partial Social Security number, both when requesting a mail-in ballot and when returning a completed ballot. Those numbers must match information in a voter’s record for ballot requests to be accepted and votes to be counted.

Full Article: New Texas voting rules cause rejection of hundreds of mail-in ballots | The Texas Tribune

Virginia elections commissioner, who Youngkin is replacing, announces departure | Graham Moomaw/Virginia Mercury

Virginia elections Commissioner Chris Piper is leaving his post March 11 after Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s administration formally told him he won’t be reappointed to the job, according to an internal email Piper sent his agency Friday. Piper, an appointee of former Gov. Ralph Northam, said in the email he had agreed to stay on a few more weeks to “ensure a smooth transition.” “I am disappointed because I would like nothing more than to spend the next four years in this chair working hand in hand with each of you as we labor to restore the nation’s faith in our election process,” Piper said in an email to employees of the state Department of Elections. “However, I am comforted by the fact that I will be leaving this place in your hands.” Youngkin has not yet named a replacement for Piper. But Piper’s email notes Rachel Lawless, currently a confidential policy adviser in the department, “has been reappointed to her role and will continue to serve.” “My promise to each of you is that I will do everything in my power to make sure you are set up for nothing but success,” Piper said. “My loyalty has always been to you, the State Board, the general registrars, Electoral Board members, thousands of election officers, voters, and future voters of the commonwealth.”

 

Full Article: Virginia elections commissioner, who Youngkin is replacing, announces departure – Virginia Mercury

Wisconsin Is Ground Zero for the MAGA Effort to Steal the Next Election | Andy Kroll/Rolling Stone

At 5:01 p.m. on Thursday, Dec. 2, Tim Ramthun was sitting in his living room with the TV on when his cellphone rang. He turned to his wife of four decades, Carolann. “Oh, the president’s calling,” he told her. She scoffed. “Hello, Mr. President,” Ramthun said to the caller. “This is Representative Ramthun. May I help you?” Carolann still didn’t believe him, until she heard the voice on the other end and almost fell out of her chair. She started recording a video of her husband, a junior member of the Wisconsin state Assembly, receiving praise from the 45th president of the United States. Ramthun wasn’t surprised by Donald Trump’s call. A few weeks earlier, Trump had left a message on his work phone at the state Capitol at 6:30 in the morning. Trump had wanted to thank Ramthun for his continued efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, something Trump proceeded to do later that day in a written statement praising Ramthun for “putting forward a very powerful and very popular, because it’s true, resolution to decertify the 2020 Presidential Election in Wisconsin based on the recently found absolute proof of large scale voter fraud that took place.”

Full Article: The MAGA Laboratory for Autocracy – Rolling Stone