The government wants to know more about how we vote. No. President Trump authorized the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity to investigate voter fraud in the 2016 election. Independent studies all have shown that voter fraud is either non-existent or is so slight that its effect is minimal. Nevertheless, Trump established the commission last month. Its report is expected in 2018. Studying election results is nothing new. Campaigns do it to see what worked and what didn’t. Most rely on public information for their research. This commission, however, goes a dangerous step beyond. Letters were sent out last week to all 50 states and the District of Columbia asking for evidence of voter fraud, convictions for election-related crimes and recommendations for preventing voter intimidation.
More disturbing, the panel requested information including names, dates of birth, voting histories, party identifications and even portions of Social Security numbers. All was to be submitted within 16 days.
So far, 44 states, including Oklahoma, have refused to supply all or part of the information. Twenty of those states and the District of Columbia have rejected the request outright. According to the Oklahoma Election Board, it is required to provide public information upon request, but it won’t be supplying full or partial Social Security numbers, which are not available to the public.
Full Article: Tulsa World editorial: Commission wants to snoop on voting in the name of ‘integrity’ | Editorials | tulsaworld.com.