National: A top GOP lawyer wants to crack down on the college vote. States already are. – Zachary Roth/Virginia Mercury
A top Republican election lawyer recently caused a stir when she told GOP donors that the party should work to make it harder for college students to vote in key states. But the comments from Cleta Mitchell, who worked closely with then-President Donald Trump to try to overturn the 2020 election, are perhaps less surprising than they seem. They follow numerous efforts in recent years by Republican lawmakers across the country to restrict voting by college students, a group that leans Democratic. And they come at a time when the youth vote has been surging. At an April 15 retreat for donors to the Republican National Committee, Mitchell, a leader in the broader conservative push to impose new voting restrictions, called on her party to find ways to tighten the rules for student voting in several battleground states. Mitchell’s comments were first posted online by the independent progressive journalist Lauren Windsor. With Republicans now enjoying veto-proof majorities in both of North Carolina’s chambers, Mitchell said, the party has a chance to crack down on voting by students there. Full Article: A top GOP lawyer wants to crack down on the college vote. States already are. - Virginia MercuryNational: Dominion speaks out after Fox News settlement | Dan Primack/Axios
Fox News, one of America's most powerful media companies, earlier this month agreed to pay $787.5 million to settle a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems, related to false statements made about Dominion on Fox's air. John Poulos, CEO of Dominion Voting Systems: We founded the company in 2003. The first check was from my sister for $50,000. We survived and grew in the following years, really relying on friends and family. By the time we got to 2017, heading into 2018, two things happened: One was the friends and family were looking for an exit. We hadn't distributed anything, not even a dollar to our investors, even though we had grown substantially. So we hired an investment bank in late 2017. They identified a number of interested parties, one of which was a strategic that wanted to buy 100% of the equity. We weren't interested. As part of that process, I met Hootan. Full Article: Dominion speaks out after Fox News settlementNational push to bolster security of key election technology | Christina A. Cassidy/Associated Press
An effort to create a national testing program for technology central to U.S elections will be launched later this year, aiming to strengthen the security of equipment that has been targeted by foreign governments and provided fertile ground for conspiracy theories. So far, states have been left on their own to evaluate the technology that provides the backbone of election operations: voter registration databases, websites used to report unofficial results on election night and electronic pollbooks, which are used instead of paper rolls to check in voters at polling places. The nonprofit Center for Internet Security hopes to provide the nation’s first uniform testing program for the technology, similar to one for voting machines. Its goal is to start the voluntary service in September as a way to help boost the security and reliability of the technology before the 2024 presidential election. In 2020, 15 states, including Arizona, Florida and Nevada, did not require any type of electronic pollbook testing or certification, according to federal data. “This is a critical need being filled at a critical time,” said Chris Wlaschin, senior vice president for Election Systems & Software, a leading voting machine manufacturer that also produces electronic pollbooks. “I think as more election officials learn about it, the more they’re going to ask for it.” Full Article: National push to bolster security of key election technology | AP NewsRoy Saltman, election expert who warned of hanging chads, dies at 90 | Michael S. Rosenwald/The Washington Post
Roy G. Saltman, who as the federal government’s top expert on voting technology wrote a prescient but little-read report warning about hanging chads on punch-card ballots, more than a decade before the issue paralyzed the nation during the 2000 presidential election recount in Florida, died April 21 at a nursing home in Rockville, Md. He was 90. The cause was complications from several recent strokes, said his grandson Max Saltman. Like legions of Washington bureaucrats who are vital figures in their narrow fields but largely unknown to the wider public, Mr. Saltman toiled in obscurity for decades at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, where he wrote several reports examining the history of voting devices and the problems with them. In a 132-page report published in 1988, Mr. Saltman detailed how hanging chads — the tiny pieces of cardboard that sometimes aren’t totally punched out on ballots — had plagued several recent elections, including a 1984 race for property appraiser in Palm Beach County, Fla. “It is recommended,” Mr. Saltman wrote, “that the use of pre-scored punch card ballots be ended.” Full Article: Roy Saltman, election expert who warned of hanging chads, dies at 90 - The Washington PostNational: Massive turnover in local election officials likely before 2024, says new survey | Jane C. Timm/NBC
A new survey from the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law predicts huge turnover in local election officials before the 2024 election. According to the survey, 12% of local officials began working in their roles after the 2020 election and 11% said they were very or somewhat likely to quit before next year’s election. A small number fell into both categories: new employees who suggested they will leave. Such turnover — about 1 in 5 of all election workers — is significant, the Brennan Center said, and equivalent to one to two election officials’ leaving office every day since the 2020 election. Harassment and threats may be driving some of the departures. Thirty percent of respondents said they’d been personally harassed, abused or threatened, while 22% said they personally knew of election officials who had left their jobs “at least in part because of fear for their safety, increased threats, or intimidation.” (Just 4% of respondents said they knew “many” election officials who were quitting for that reason; the rest said they knew “one or two.”) Full Article: Massive turnover in local election officials likely before 2024, says new surveyNational: Testimony Suggests Trump Was at Meeting About Accessing Voting Software in 2020 | Richard Fausset and Danny Hakim/The New York Times
Former President Donald J. Trump took part in a discussion about plans to access voting system software in Michigan and Georgia as part of the effort to challenge his 2020 election loss, according to testimony from former Trump advisers. The testimony, delivered to the House Jan. 6 committee, was highlighted on Friday in a letter to federal officials from a liberal-leaning legal advocacy group. Allies of Mr. Trump ultimately succeeded in copying the elections software in those two states, and the breach of voting data in Georgia is being examined by prosecutors as part of a broader criminal investigation into whether Mr. Trump and his allies interfered in the presidential election there. The former president’s participation in the discussion of the Georgia plan could increase his risk of possible legal exposure there. A number of Trump aides and allies have recounted a lengthy and acrimonious meeting in the Oval Office on Dec. 18, 2020, which one member of the House Jan. 6 committee would later call “the craziest meeting of the Trump presidency.” During the meeting, then-President Trump presided as his advisers argued about whether they should seek to have federal agents seize voting machines to analyze them for fraud. Full Article: Testimony Suggests Trump Was at Meeting About Accessing Voting Software in 2020 - The New York TimesNational: The pessimist’s case on the state of American democracy | Zach Montdellaro/Politico
The 2022 election was cast as a defining moment for the future of American democracy, as ballots were filled with election conspiracy-minded candidates running for the offices that actually oversee elections. Most of the focus — including from yours truly — was on the very top of the pyramid: secretaries of state, who in most states serve as the chief election official. A cadre of Trump-aligned election deniers ran for that position in battleground states across the country. Every single one of them lost, either in a Republican primary or to a Democrat in November. At the time, it was framed as a big victory for “lowercase d” democrats — the collective wins of election officials who aren’t likely to entertain a Trumpian attempt to overthrow an election were viewed as a critical bulwark for the security of the 2024 results. Don’t be so sure. A new report shared first with Nightly from Informing Democracy — an under-the-radar research nonprofit of election experts, researchers, and lawyers — argues that while it was a normative good that those top-of-the-ticket candidates lost, people are missing the forest for a few particularly tall trees. Full Article: The pessimist’s case on the state of American democracy - POLITICONational: Smartmatic defeats patent lawsuit from voting machine rival ES&S | Blake Brittain/Reuters
Voting technology company Smartmatic USA Corp on Tuesday fended off a patent infringement lawsuit brought by competitor Election Systems & Software LLC, persuading a federal judge that the last patent remaining in the case is invalid. U.S. District Judge Richard Andrews in Delaware said the voting-machine patent covered unpatentable abstract ideas related to "the individual steps of voting." "Our position has been vindicated and we look forward to putting this matter behind us," Smartmatic general counsel Colin Flannery said in a statement. Representatives for ES&S did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Omaha, Nebraska-based ES&S sued the U.S. branch of London-based Smartmatic in Delaware in 2018. It said Smartmatic infringed two patents related to improved voter-assistance terminals and ballot-marking devices in voting machines that allow for "more accurate, secure, and efficient voting," especially for users with physical impairments. ES&S said it learned of Smartmatic's alleged infringement when the companies both submitted bids for a project to modernize Los Angeles County's voting system, which Smartmatic won. Full Article: Smartmatic defeats patent lawsuit from voting machine rival ES&S | ReutersNational: A second firm hired by Trump campaign found no evidence of election fraud | Josh Dawsey/The Washington Post
Former president Trump’s campaign quietly commissioned a second firm to study election fraud claims in the weeks after the 2020 election, and the founder of the firm was recently questioned by the Justice Department about his work disproving the claims. Ken Block, founder of the firm Simpatico Software Systems, studied more than a dozen voter fraud theories and allegations for Trump’s campaign in late 2020 and found they were “all false,” he said in an interview with The Washington Post. “No substantive voter fraud was uncovered in my investigations looking for it, nor was I able to confirm any of the outside claims of voter fraud that I was asked to look at,” he said. “Every fraud claim I was asked to investigate was false.” Block said he recently received a subpoena from special counsel Jack Smith’s office and met with federal prosecutors in Washington, but he declined to discuss his interactions with them. Block said he contemporaneously sent his findings disputing fraud claims in writing to the Trump campaign in late 2020. Full Article: A second firm hired by Trump campaign found no evidence of election fraud - The Washington PostNational: Fox to hand over documents for 2nd voting machine lawsuit | Bobby Caina Calvan/Associated Press
Fox News agreed Wednesday to hand over thousands of documents to voting machine company Smartmatic, which is suing the network for defamation in a case similar to Dominion Voting Machines’ just-settled lawsuit. Smartmatic says Fox bears financial responsibility for airing false allegations that the company rigged the 2020 presidential election against former President Donald Trump. Last week, Fox agreed to pay Dominion nearly $800 million to avert a trial, although the ultimate cost to the media company is likely to be much lower. Smartmatic wants a $2.7 billion judgment, which far exceeds the $1.6 billion Dominion sought in its suit. No date has been set, and the case might not go to court for a couple of years. Smartmatic said in court filings that Fox “slow-rolled its production” of transcripts and other material that were created during the Dominion suit, and that Smartmatic had received just a small fraction of the more than 52,000 documents it requested as part of the discovery process. Full Article: Fox to hand over documents for 2nd voting machine lawsuit | AP NewsGeorgia: Text messages reveal Trump operatives considered using breached voting data to decertify Senate runoff in 2021 | Zachary Cohen/CNN
In mid-January 2021, two men hired by former President Donald Trump’s legal team discussed over text message what to do with data obtained from a breached voting machine in a rural county in Georgia, including whether to use it as part of an attempt to decertify the state’s pending Senate runoff results. The texts, sent two weeks after operatives breached a voting machine in Coffee County, Georgia, reveal for the first time that Trump allies considered using voting data not only to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, but also in an effort to keep a Republican hold on the US Senate. “Here’s the plan. Let’s keep this close hold,” Jim Penrose, a former NSA official working with Trump lawyer Sidney Powell to access voting machines in Georgia, wrote in a January 19 text to Doug Logan, CEO of Cyber Ninjas, a firm that purports to run audits of voting systems. In the text, which was obtained by CNN and has not been previously reported, Penrose references the upcoming certification of Democrat Jon Ossoff’s win over Republican David Perdue. “We only have until Saturday to decide if we are going to use this report to try to decertify the Senate run-off election or if we hold it for a bigger moment,” Penrose wrote, referring to a potential lawsuit. Full Article: Trump operatives considered using breached voting data to decertify Georgia's Senate runoff in 2021, text messages show | CNN PoliticsNational: After Fox settlement, experts warn election falsehoods will persist | Patrick Marley and Jeremy Barr/The Washington Post
Fox News’s $787.5 million settlement with a voting machine company sends a stark warning to others about the cost of making false statements, but that doesn’t mean election falsehoods will disappear. The constellation of conservative networks and right-wing websites that promote those falsehoods may just become more adept at spreading conspiracy theories and baseless claims, election officials and misinformation experts say, such as by avoiding naming companies and individuals. “There are people who are so committed to the perpetuation of this narrative that it won’t die completely,” said Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer (R), a top election official in Arizona’s largest county. “There are organizations, candidates, fundraisers who this has been their life for a few years, and one settlement isn’t going to make them probably throw away their entire business model.” Election officials and academics described Fox’s settlement with Dominion Voting Systems as one small part of a broad effort to restore Americans’ faith in elections and hold those who tell falsehoods accountable. On its own, the settlement might not change much, they said. Full Article: After Fox settlement, experts warn election falsehoods will persist - The Washington PostNational: Fox Settles Dominion Suit, but Smartmatic Case and Others Loom | Lora Kelley/The New York Times
On Tuesday, Fox News hastily agreed to pay $787.5 million to resolve a defamation suit filed by Dominion Voting Systems — among the largest settlements ever in a defamation case — just hours after the jury for the trial was selected. In addition to the whopping financial settlement, Fox conceded that “certain claims” it had made about Dominion were false. In settling with Dominion, the network avoided the possible embarrassment of a trial that could have exposed its inner workings. Rupert Murdoch, the 92-year-old Fox News founder, and the Fox host Tucker Carlson were potential witnesses. Dominion sued the cable news network two years ago, after it aired stories falsely claiming that Dominion’s voting machines were susceptible to hacking and had flipped votes to Joseph R. Biden Jr. that had been cast for Donald J. Trump, who was president. But the settlement with Dominion is not the only legal action that some news outlets are facing after making bogus claims about the 2020 elections. Full Article: Fox Settles Dominion Suit, but Smartmatic Case and Others Loom - The New York TimesNational: Fox and Dominion settle for $787.5m in defamation lawsuit over US election lies | Sam Levine and Kira Lerner/The Guardian
Fox and the voting equipment company Dominion reached a $787.5m settlement in a closely watched defamation lawsuit, ending a dispute over whether the network and its parent company knowingly broadcast false and outlandish allegations that Dominion was involved in a plot to steal the 2020 election. The settlement came before scheduled opening statements and after an unexpected lengthy delay on Tuesday afternoon just after the jury was sworn in. Neither party immediately disclosed the terms of the settlement other than the dollar amount, and attorneys for Dominion declined to answer questions about whether it requires Fox to issue a retraction or a formal apology. “The parties have resolved their case,” Judge Eric Davis told jurors on Tuesday afternoon before excusing them from the courtroom. In a press conference outside the courthouse, the Dominion attorney Justin Nelson said the more than $787m represented “vindication and accountability”. The settlement amount is less than half of the $1.6bn Dominion demanded in its lawsuit. “Truth matters,” he said. “Lies have consequences. The truth does not know red or blue,” he continued. “People across the political spectrum can and should disagree on issues, even of the most profound importance. But for our democracy to endure another 250 years and hopefully much longer, we must share a commitment to facts.” Full Article: Fox and Dominion settle for $787.5m in defamation lawsuit over US election lies | Fox News-Dominion case | The GuardianNational: EAC Commissioner takes part in secretive GOP conference, sparking backlash | Zachary Roth/News From The States
A commissioner of a federal elections agency recently spoke at a secretive conference of conservative voting activists and Republican secretaries of state and congressional staff — a step that election experts call highly improper for an official charged with helping states administer fair and unbiased elections. U.S. Election Assistance Commissioner Donald Palmer, the former chief election official in Virginia, was a panelist at a February conference organized by conservative groups working to impose new voting restrictions, including the Heritage Foundation. Ten chief state election officials, as well as elections staff from three additional Republican-led states, attended the confab, which was described by one prominent organizer as a “private, confidential meeting.” The existence of the conference, including its agenda and list of attendees, was first reported by The Guardian U.S. and the investigative journalism site Documented. In a statement to States Newsroom, Palmer defended his appearance, calling it “an important opportunity to engage.” Palmer, who was appointed by former President Donald Trump, is one of two Republican members of the four-member commission, which by law is divided evenly between the two main political parties. Full Article: U.S. elections official takes part in secretive GOP conference, sparking backlash | News From The StatesNational: Mike Lindell firm told to pay $5 million in ‘Prove Mike Wrong’ election-fraud challenge | Chris Dehghanpoor, Emma Brown and Jon Swaine/The Washington Post
MyPillow founder and prominent election denier Mike Lindell made a bold offer ahead of a “cyber symposium” he held in August 2021 in South Dakota: He claimed he had data showing Chinese interference and said he would pay $5 million to anyone who could prove the material was not from the previous year’s U.S. election. He called the challenge “Prove Mike Wrong.” On Wednesday, a private arbitration panel ruled that someone did. The panel said Robert Zeidman, a computer forensics expert and 63-year-old Trump voter from Nevada, was entitled to the $5 million payout. Zeidman had examined Lindell’s data and concluded that not only did it not prove voter fraud, it also had no connection to the 2020 election. He was the only expert who submitted a claim, arbitration records show. He turned to the arbitrators after Lindell Management, which created the contest, refused to pay him. In their 23-page decision, the arbitrators said Zeidman proved that Lindell’s material “unequivocally did not reflect November 2020 election data.” They directed Lindell’s firm to pay Zeidman within 30 days. In a statement to The Washington Post, Zeidman said he was “really happy” with the arbitrators’ decision. “They clearly saw this as I did — that the data we were given at the symposium was not at all what Mr. Lindell said it was,” he said. “The truth is finally out there.” Full Article: Mike Lindell firm told to pay $5 million in ‘Prove Mike Wrong’ election-fraud challenge - The Washington PostNational: GOP lawyer Cleta Mitchell decries ease of ‘campus voting’ in private RNC pitch | Josh Dawsey and Amy Gardner/The Washington Post
A top Republican legal strategist told a roomful of GOP donors over the weekend that conservatives must band together to limit voting on college campuses, same-day voter registration and automatic mailing of ballots to registered voters, according to a copy of her presentation reviewed by The Washington Post. Cleta Mitchell, a longtime GOP lawyer and fundraiser who worked closely with former president Donald Trump to try to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, gave the presentation at a Republican National Committee donor retreat in Nashville on Saturday. The presentation — which had more than 50 slides and was labeled “A Level Playing Field for 2024” — offered a window into a strategy that seems designed to reduce voter access and turnout among certain groups, including students and those who vote by mail, both of which tend to skew Democratic. Mitchell did not respond to a request for comment, and it is unclear whether she delivered the presentation exactly as it was prepared on her PowerPoint slides. But in addition to the presentation, The Post listened to audio of portions of the presentation obtained by liberal journalist Lauren Windsor in which Mitchell discussed limiting campus and early voting. Full Article: GOP lawyer Cleta Mitchell decries ease of ‘campus voting’ in private RNC pitch - The Washington PostNational: ‘Our democracy can’t function’ without poll workers. Here’s how some states are protecting them | Phillip M. Bailey/USA Today
Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon is nervous about the 2024 presidential election. The Gopher State will need roughly 30,000 elections workers to oversee and administer hundreds of polling places, but it’s becoming difficult to get civic-minded Americans to volunteer. That's because Minnesota, like many other states, saw an uptick in abusive behavior towards poll workers leading up to last year’s midterms, he said. “If we continue to see a climate that is increasingly negative or unwelcoming to them, we're going to have problems recruiting and retaining those folks,” Simon told USA TODAY. “It is a problem in Minnesota. It is a problem nationally.” Full Article: Ahead of 2024, election workers get new protections in some statesNational: What’s in Dominion Voting’s $1.6 billion lawsuit against Fox News | Bente Birkelund/NPR
When Dominion Voting Systems sued Fox News over the lies the conservative cable network had broadcast in 2020 about the election tech company, the enormous $1.6 billion damage claim jumped out. The trial begins next week in Delaware and two of the biggest questions facing the jurors will be whether Fox and its executives are liable for broadcasting the lies and, if so, whether $1.6 billion is a remotely realistic amount to ask for. ... According to an analysis provided to NPR by the election security group Verified Voting, Dominion has actually seen a net increase in jurisdictions using Dominion equipment since 2020. The nonprofit monitors election equipment contracts around the country. For example in 2020, 1,161 jurisdictions used Dominion election day tabulation equipment. Verified Voting's analysis says 1,861 jurisdictions will use Dominion equipment in 2024. That said, there's been a net loss in the total number of registered voters who will vote with Dominion's machines in upcoming elections. Full Article: What's in Dominion Voting's $1.6 billion lawsuit against Fox News : NPRNational: Election officials have ideas for stopping a 2024 crisis before it even starts | Zach Montellaro/Politico
Election officials have one major goal ahead of 2024: Make Democracy Boring Again. Election administration has faced an unprecedented amount of scrutiny — and tumult — since the 2020 election. Officials have faced death threats and unprecedented public harassment stemming from mis- and disinformation. Many workers are leaving the field. Now, the Bipartisan Policy Center is out with a new report with 23 recommendations for election administration to turn down the temperature. The premise of the report, shared first with POLITICO, is to make behind-the-scenes improvements to how elections are administered in 2024 and beyond. “Election officials do want elections to become boring again,” said Rachel Orey, the associate director of the BPC’s Elections Project and an author of the report. “We need to think more realistically about what it is that we actually need to do to improve elections.” They might have their work cut out for them. Full Article: Election officials have ideas for stopping a 2024 crisis before it even starts - POLITICONational: GOP distrust in voting machines persists as Dominion and Fox News head to legal showdown | Fredreka Schouten and Marshall Cohen/CNN
First, the Shasta County Board of Supervisors in rural northern California voted to cancel its contract with Dominion Voting Systems, citing public distrust of the company’s machines. Then, the supervisors agreed to shift to hand-counting ballots in future elections after receiving written assurance from one of the most vocal 2020 election deniers – MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell – that he would provide “financial and legal” resources to the county if it faced “pushback” over the move. The decision by a majority of supervisors in this deeply conservative county to end the Dominion contract – years before its expiration date and over the objection of the county’s top election official – illustrates how the attacks against the company continue to reverberate more than two years after the 2020 election. Dominion is preparing to face off in the coming days against Fox News in a Delaware courtroom in a high-profile $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit. Dominion claims the network “recklessly disregarded the truth” by peddling conspiracies advanced by former President Donald Trump and his allies about its voting systems. Fox News has denied any wrongdoing. Dominion has also sued Lindell and Trump-aligned attorneys Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani, along with two smaller right-wing networks, Newsmax and One America News Network. Each lawsuit offers detailed rebuttals of the conspiracy theories that have flourished in pockets of the country and conservative media circles ever since Trump and his allies began pushing claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. Full Article: GOP distrust in voting machines persists as Dominion and Fox News head to legal showdown | CNN PoliticsNational: Misinformation Defense Worked in 2020, Up to a Point, Study Finds | Tiffany Hsu/The New York Times
Not long after misinformation plagued the 2016 election, journalists and content moderators scrambled to turn Americans away from untrustworthy websites before the 2020 vote. A new study suggests that, to some extent, their efforts succeeded. When Americans went to the polls in 2020, a far smaller portion had visited websites containing false and misleading narratives compared with four years earlier, according to researchers at Stanford. Although the number of such sites ballooned, the average visits among those people dropped, along with the time spent on each site. Efforts to educate people about the risk of misinformation after 2016, including content labels and media literacy training, most likely contributed to the decline, the researchers found. Their study was published on Thursday in the journal Nature Human Behaviour. “I am optimistic that the majority of the population is increasingly resilient to misinformation on the web,” said Jeff Hancock, the founding director of the Stanford Social Media Lab and the lead author of the report. “We’re getting better and better at distinguishing really problematic, bad, harmful information from what’s reliable or entertainment.”
Full Article: Misinformation Defense Worked in 2020, Up to a Point, Study Finds – The New York Times