http://www.kansascity.com/news...rticle158871959.html

As you have probably heard, the Trump administration has requested all 50 states provide voter data for the purpose of investigating voter fraud. 20 states have refused. My opinion is that if the feds want the data, they need to use a legal means to get it. Being ignorant of the law, I don't know what that is, but I would assume it is a demand reviewed by the judiciary something like a search warrant. I believe it is dangerous for the central federal government to have voting data on every voter in the country. Yes, there is a fraud problem. It does not exist everywhere. Kentucky, for example, has strong voter ID laws. I am required to show ID every time I vote, so I believe the fraud is very low here. This is not true in other states. I believe some criteria must be established to get "probable cause" of some type. For example, if the number of votes cast in a particular area exceeded the number of voters, or if 100 percent of a district voted a certain way, then this data could be demanded.

I'd like some opinions on this from you all because I respect this group. You often present well-reasoned, cogent arguments, and I really can't get that many other places.

I did not put this in the form of a poll because I don't want a "tick the box" response, I truly want your opinions. I'm not looking for validation-criticism is welcome.

Thank you!

All the states that do not have positive I D need to be seriously looked at.
You know so that we don't have voting from the grave.

If you believe there is voter fraud occurring and you want it investigated, then give up the data. Why should your state be inconvenienced any less than another just because you fear big government with your info, and you have stricter/better laws. If indeed your state has the best voter id proof in the nation, then it will hardly get a glance, but the gov't shouldn't be giving the appearance of discriminating because of political affiliation/leanings of the states.

It is a legit concern on the data, but since all 50 states partake in the election, then all 50 should be investigated, even if we think deep down that it's just the lefty states doing it. If you exempt states for whatever reason from being investigated (even for good reasons like you stated), then it becomes an unequal tool for political discrimination.

Unfortunately, "investigations" are always invasive, however it must include all possible participants/actors (in this case all 50 states) to be a real investigation with the unlikely culprits (states with good voter id laws) probably not being as closely examined as others without. Yeah they are going to get your data if you want a investigation into voter fraud, but on the bright side (sarcasm), it's likely they already have all your data anyway.

Asked to make a list of states with the most voting fraud, we'd all pretty much have the same list. Were the federal government to use that to correct data, those states would scream loudly. Instead all states are asked to provided data.
It would be interesting to compare the states refusing to provide data to the list. But they we might already know the answer.

The only man I ever knew who could counteract this passion on the part of Democrats for voting, was Robert Roach, carpenter of the steamer Aleck Scott, "plying to and from St. Louis to New Orleans and back," as her advertisement sometimes read. The Democrats generally came up as deck passengers from New Orleans, and the yellow fever used to get them right and left - eight or nine a day for the first six or eight hundred miles; consequently Roach would have a lot on hand to "plant" every time the boat landed to wood - "plant" was Roach's word.
One day as Roach was superintending a burial the Captain came up and said: "God bless my soul, Roach, what do you mean by shoving a corpse into a hole in the hill-side in this barbarous way, face down and its feet sticking out?"
"I always plant them Democrats in that manner, sir, because, damn their souls, if you plant 'em any other way they'll dig out and vote the first time there's an election - but look at that fellow, now - you put 'em in head first and face down and the more they dig the deeper they'll go into the hill. --- Mark Twain: Early Tales & Sketches, Vol. 2, 1864-1865

I honestly don't see what is wrong with requesting the same data that is public information anyway.

...this is just another Liberal excuse for mouth-frothing, mock freakoutrage!

Remember how they were insisting that Trump's claims of voter fraud were "unsubstantiated" ?

Well, how is anyone supposed to "substantiate" them if no one can look at the data ?!?!

I find the following interesting

quote:

California Secretary of State Alex Padilla said in a statement that he will “not provide sensitive voter information to a commission that has already inaccurately passed judgment that millions of Californians voted illegally.”

“California’s participation would only serve to legitimize the false and already debunked claims of massive voter fraud made by the President, the Vice President, and Mr. Kobach. The President’s Commission is a waste of taxpayer money and a distraction from the real threats to the integrity of our elections today: aging voting systems and documented Russian interference in our elections,” Padilla said.

If I understand him correctly, the charge that illegal voting in California has already been debunked. -- when did this get debunked and by whom?

This would be a waste of taxpayer money. -- Refer to the current California state budget and their plans for single payer health coverage for everyone.

The real threats being an aging voting system and the documented interference by the Russians. -- In other words modernize voting by carrying on elections over the internet, so [SARCASM]it will be more secure and fraud will be impossible[/SARCASM].

Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Shumer couldn't have said it better.

So what do we believe the government might do with this data? Your name, birthday and SS number. Do we suppose that the Federal government doesn't already have this information? Will tying it to the fact that a person voted in the elections create any particular danger to the individual? By the Federal government putting this information into a database for this purpose pose any particular danger to the individuals? Consider the IRS already has all this in their databases, just not tied to the voting.

I'm at a loss for why this would be a bad thing. Honestly, educate me. Why would this be a bad thing unless someone wanted to cover up that some illegal alien voted a dozen time in 4 different precincts during the elections and he's just one of thousands who did the same thing? Sounds to me like the socialist/left is just playing their usual games.

Since you have to work through multiple links to get to it, I thought it might help this thread if the verbiage of the actual request (in this case, the request sent to Connecticut) were posted:

===
...As the Commission begins it work, I invite you to contribute your views and
recommendations throughout this process.

In particular:
1. What changes, if any, to federal election laws would you recommend to enhance the integrity of federal elections?
2. How can the Commission support state and local election administrators with regard to information technology security and vulnerabilities?
3. What laws, policies, or other issues hinder your ability to ensure the integrity of elections you administer?
4. What evidence or information do you have regarding instances of voter fraud or registration fraud in your state?
5. What convictions for election-related crimes have occurred in your state since the
November 2000 federal election?
6. What recommendations do you have for preventing voter intimidation or disenfranchisement?
7. What other issues do you believe the Commission should consider?

In addition, in order for the Commission to fully analyze vulnerabilities and issues related to voter registration and voting, I am requesting that you provide to the Commission the publicly-available voter roll data for Connecticut, including, if publicly available under the laws of your state, the full first and last names of all registrants, middle names or initials if available, addresses, dates of birth, political party (if recorded in your state), last four digits of social security number if available, voter history (elections voted in) from 2006 onward, active/inactive status, cancelled status, information regarding any felony convictions, information regarding voter registration in another state, information regarding military status, and overseas citizen
information...

===

This all looks pretty reasonable to me, and I'd specifically point out that the feds asked for the PUBLICLY AVAILABLE data. If you wrote to your own state's AG and requested that data, they'd be legally obligated to provide it to you. I do tax assessing, and all of my records are public records. If anybody anywhere sends me a specific request for those records, I *have* to comply. The most resistance I can legally give is to charge them for the actual cost of generating the records.

In short, the states that refuse to give any data back are violating their own FOI laws. This is just ass-hattery on their part.

I think the evil Trumpmonster has set up a bunch of kneejerkers for another public humiliation.

My only possible objection to it would be concern about the security given to this new database. We bad-mouth the IRS a lot, and they have all the personal data, but so far their database has been pretty secure. I don't know that I can assume this one would be as well protected.

flashguy

I support the commission that has been set up to investigate voter fraud.

We have been complaining about it for the last 8 years. Do you think California and NY will resolve it?

Terry McAuliffe (Gov VA):

there is no evidence of voter fraud in the state.

remember the story of the college kid convicted of attempting fraudulent voter registration?

"We will not let Donald Trump and right wing extremists use this as some covert plan to get data to make it harder for people to vote," McAuliffe said

code words: "make it harder for people to vote" = make it harder to execute organized voter fraud

The DEMs who all hate voter photo ID also hate a commission to look for voter fraud.

The Feds can have my data.
I am tired of people illegally voting cancelling out my vote.

Voting is so sacred and so important, it must be investigated.

I bet there were at least 2 million illegal votes in the last election.
It's got to stop, it's ruining our country.

Time was in this country, one had to have skin in the game to vote, ie property ownership.
The Founders never intended for everyone to vote because they knew that those without skin in the game would vote themselves money from other people's wallets.

And that is exactly what is happening these days.

I think that if I have to show ID and go thru a background check to exercise my 2nd A rights then I should have to do the same for voting rights. It only makes sense. And if a State refuses to produce solid records of it's voting rolls to the public then we have a major problem. Done without transparency leads to all sorts of shenanigans. I know I'm in Maryland Democrat ruled for 60 years. Chris

quote:

I bet there were at least 2 million illegal votes in the last election.
It's got to stop, it's ruining our country.

If my aging memory is correct, I have seen some estimates (some time ago) that there were some 5 MILLION illegal votes cast in the last election.

The only way to avoid it is to have a nation wide system of voter registration, with photo ID required.

And all that hand wringing BS about it being racist because so many blacks can't afford photo ID is just that bull shit. Some jurisdictions where that topic was raised said they would provide the IDs free of charge. Then the BS started about how hard it was for blacks to get to the place issuing said cards.

The democraPs do not want voter ID (photo) because it will prevent them from busing loads of voters to various polling places to vote for the democraPs.

When I go to vote here, I was required to show photo ID.

Thank you all. Good to hear other intelligent points of view, helps clarify my thinking.

quote:

Originally posted by jbcummings:
I find the following interesting

quote:

California Secretary of State Alex Padilla said in a statement that he will “not provide sensitive voter information to a commission that has already inaccurately passed judgment that millions of Californians voted illegally.”

“California’s participation would only serve to legitimize the false and already debunked claims of massive voter fraud made by the President, the Vice President, and Mr. Kobach. The President’s Commission is a waste of taxpayer money and a distraction from the real threats to the integrity of our elections today: aging voting systems and documented Russian interference in our elections,” Padilla said.

If I understand him correctly, the charge that illegal voting in California has already been debunked. -- when did this get debunked and by whom?

Hey, give the asshole credit. He managed to work 'Russia' into his blather.

The Feds have lots of leverage on this....I wouldn't expect the state where over 100% of Clinton's popular vote margin came from (do recall that summing up the other 49, Trump won both electoral AND popular vote....) to provide their data upon a simple request, any more than the 'global warming' researchers hand theirs over.

But...next time they come with their hand out for Federal funds...BINGO!

At a minimum, I expect CA to balk, if only to try to buy time to clean it up. Which Trump should let them have, IMO ....and then launch a Federal investigation of the state electoral bureaucracy, looking for evidence of such cleansing.

I have no issue with this, hell, the feds already have more in-depth info on me for my security clearance than GA has in their voter database.

I would very much love to see the "there's no voter fraud" crowd proven wrong.

quote:

Originally posted by jbcummings:
I find the following interesting

quote:

California Secretary of State Alex Padilla said in a statement that he will “not provide sensitive voter information to a commission that has already inaccurately passed judgment that millions of Californians voted illegally.”

“California’s participation would only serve to legitimize the false and already debunked claims of massive voter fraud made by the President, the Vice President, and Mr. Kobach. The President’s Commission is a waste of taxpayer money and a distraction from the real threats to the integrity of our elections today: aging voting systems and documented Russian interference in our elections,” Padilla said.

If I understand him correctly, the charge that illegal voting in California has already been debunked. -- when did this get debunked and by whom?

They told us, that's who and how.

Oh and "they" are this state's super majority democratic legislative, judicial, and executive branches.

That is all we need to know

I'm just very uneasy with this data all being collected in one place, especially a government place, especially a US Government place. My personal data has been lost three times, but the Army, OPM, and the IRS. Can they be trusted with data as valuable as this? to transcribe VA loan data.

quote:

Originally posted by Fredward:
I'm just very uneasy with this data all being collected in one place, especially a government place, especially a US Government place. My personal data has been lost three times, but the Army, OPM, and the IRS. Can they be trusted with data as valuable as this? to transcribe VA loan data.

Did they loose your data to outside parties OR are they just so incompetent they can't work with each other internally to keep your records straight? Thing is they already have it.

quote:

Originally posted by Crom:
I honestly don't see what is wrong with requesting the same data that is public information anyway.

...this is just another Liberal excuse for mouth-frothing, mock freakoutrage!

Remember how they were insisting that Trump's claims of voter fraud were "unsubstantiated" ?

Well, how is anyone supposed to "substantiate" them if no one can look at the data ?!?!

It is all publicly available information. My ex-wife worked managing databases for a company that solicited political contributions for politicians. I assure you, your voting history, donation history, email address, political affiliation, and income is already in a database. The Fed.gov could just buy it from her company if they wanted it. The only difference from the publicity available information is the last four SSN which a unique identifier is needed to determine if John A. Smith in Topeka is the same John A. Smith in Kansas City.

If you are worried about the info, it's already out there, and it's already in use.