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Mass. to federal commission seeking detailed voter data: Go screw

CommonWealth Magazine reports that Massachusetts Secretary of State William Galvin has no intentions of handing over detailed data about the state's registered voters to a federal commission headed by Mike Pence and Galvin's counterpart in Kansas, who has a strong record of voter suppression.

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How is this any different than any other information request to Bill Galvin? He always tells anyone, "Go screw!" even if the state records law says he should otherwise.

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Stopped clock and all that?

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Massachusetts law specifies that the voter data “shall not be a public record.”

Shall not, as a legal term, means "must not".

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It's going to another branch of our government, the federal. In general, federal supersedes state, county, and municipal. I'm sure 99% of 'progressives' at the tail end of the 2nd decade of the 21st century would agree.

The federal government can, of course, simply sue the state. The odds of them winning are extremely high. Or, federal law enforcement can launch a corruption investigation.

Why are some people so scared of investigations into voter fraud?

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1) The letter the government sent said they'd make the data public. So, it's not just going to "another branch of government".

2) Nobody is scared of investigating voter fraud. In fact, those investigations have already taken place in numerous locations across the country. Exceedingly small numbers of fraudulent votes were found and none of the investigations has ever turned up any impact on any modern elections.

3) If you're so concerned about fraud influencing the election, then maybe you should be pushing for further control over how armored our election system is to external tampering more.

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Try reading up a bit on the Supremacy Clause - might help you understand the issue better…

I am unfamiliar with any law that has been passed by Congress that requires states to provide detailed voting data…

Article VI, Section 2, of the U.S. Constitution provides that the "… Constitution, and the Laws of the United States … shall be the supreme Law of the Land." This Supremacy Clause has come to mean that the national government, in exercising any of the powers enumerated in the Constitution, must prevail over any conflicting or inconsistent state exercise of power. The federal preemption doctrine is a judicial response to the conflict between federal and state legislation. When it is clearly established that a federal law preempts a state law, the state law must be declared invalid.

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Aren't most of these records already publicly available? It's how the political parties know who to target with endless postcards around elections.

Of course, given this sham commission they'll likely claim all unenrolled MA voters are illegitimate. (And ignore the real story: The NSA documents showing Russia attempting to hack voting systems.)

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Otherwise known as "commuters" who do the park and ride thing, but whatevs.

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It all boils down to how laws are written. Galvin's hands may be tied, and that may be a good thing here.

While voter lists are available to some, they are not available to others, at least at the state level.

At the city/town level you may have better access. For example, I can walk in to City hall and look at the voter lists. They are available to look at in the Elections Dept. So the question is whether such a request is facilitated at the state level of government, or at the city/town level.

Even then there could be restrictions on who can get what as based on published statute.

Pondering matters here... how does such a commission determine fraud? Are they going to load all of these names into a computer someplace and run a comparison check to see if people are registered in 2 states? Locally the election systems already check for duplications by name, DOB, and SSA, and if that is found the name is flagged for checking by the local Elections Depts. A worker is then sent into the field to check the mail box and ask questions. If that is not resolved the name gets flagged and at voting time the election worker is required to stop the person and get proof of residency, otherwise the ballot is set aside until residency is confirmed. This is usually why it takes a couple fo weeks to certify vote counts.

In the 10-years i have been working as an Election Dept worker at a polling place I have only witnessed one "challenged" ballot, but have frequently required people to provide proof of residency, usually because they moved within the state. There are multiple levels of control to assure legal voter registrations, at least here in MA. It's a multi-redundant system of checks and balances.

We are required by law to attend a training class once a year to review the laws and procedures. Average class lasts about 2 hours and everyone is sent home with a "user manual" that is about 50-pages worth to take home to review and read to be prepared on voting day, because on voting day we have to be able to handle any possible situation. For the rare instances that need more help we all have cell phones connected to City Hall.

Voter fraud? Highly unlikely here. Not impossible, but highly unlikely.

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So since Russia hacked voting registration rolls wouldn't that be all the more reason to see if any fraud actually occurred? To verify Russia truly did not affect any votes?

Why are some people so opposed to this? Do people not care about voter integrity? Weren't Democrats/the left screaming after the election about Trumps "illegitimate" electoral win?

Calling this "voter suppression" is simply BS and an easy way to paint Republicans as racists bigots.

Meanwhile:
James Madison University student Andrew J. Spieles, 21, of Harrisonburg, pled guilty Monday in the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia. As part of the plea agreement, Spieles agreed to a prison sentence of 100 to 120 days.

“In July 2016 Spieles’ job was to register as many voters as possible and reported to Democratic Campaign headquarters in Harrisonburg,” a U.S. Attorney’s Office spokesperson said. “In August 2016, Spieles was directed to combine his registration numbers with those of another individual because their respective territories overlapped. After filling out a registration form for a voter, Spieles entered the information into a computer system used by the Virginia Democratic Party to track information such as name, age, address and political affiliation. Every Thursday an employee/volunteer hand-delivered the paper copies of the registration forms to the Registrar’s Office in Harrisonburg.”

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... and not about OMG I WON THE POPULAR VOTE AND BLAH BLAH FRAUD BLAH ...

I have some nice waterfront property that might interest you ... maybe even a bridge!

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How many times do we have to tell you LINK LINK LINK LINK LINK!

This is EASY TO DO: just copy the url and paste here.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/12/01/0-000002-perce...

Like this https://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/1/29/1625154/-Sure-there-s-voter-fra...

Or do you really think that we believe you when you quote uncited articles? With your history of citing fake news sources like Daily Caller and the Moonie-owned Washington Times?

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Your personal information was available in an unsecured data base on an amazon cloud website FOR SEVERAL WEEKS.

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Daily Caller is as bad a fake news site as Natural News.

Please cite your sources - and find better ones.

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Daily Caller? Its anything but...

http://wtvr.com/2017/06/26/andrew-spieles-guilty-plea/

When it doubt attack the news source! And just curious, can you find an article or report by Daily Caller that was erroneous or "fake news?" If not just admit you're a naked partisan smug liberal?

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CCD found an actual case of voting fraud! Or did he? No, he didn't.

There is no indication any fraudulent votes were cast in November’s election as a result of the improper registrations.

But let's go ahead and let some guys with a history of disenfranchising thousands of legitimate voter applicants loose on the entire country. This is curing a non-problem by making elections off-limits to potentially millions of citizens. And that's a REAL problem, unless you don't actually believe in Democracy ...

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Funny how it was all by Republicans voting twice ... https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/12/01/0-000002-perce...

Doesn't even mention Bannon and others associated with Drumpf's campaign being registered in multiple jurisdictions: https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2017-01-25/tiffany-tr...

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From the article you linked:
"Andrew J. Spieles of Harrisonburg admitted to filing the fraudulent registrations in August while working with Democratic-affiliated groups as a student at James Madison University ahead of the 2016 presidential election."

So he plead guilty of FRAUDulent registrations but not voter fraud was committed?

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So he plead guilty of FRAUDulent registrations but not voter fraud was committed?

Voter registration fraud is not the same as vote fraud.

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"The statute does provide for the secretary of state, who is the state’s chief election official, to make the file available to political parties, statewide candidates or ballot question campaigns."

Even with that, I doubt that the information that is sent to campaigns includes things like felony convictions and Social Security numbers.

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I don't think many people living in the bubble of Massachusetts appreciate just how horribly backwards Mass voting laws are, compared to the rest of the country.

- For an example of real voter transparency, visit https://vt.ncsbe.gov/RegLkup/VoterInfo/ North Carolina's voting website, and lookup John Edwards (remember him?) of Orange County. You can get his complete voter history going back 20 years.

- Massachusetts got early voting last year. Yawn. Most of the country has had early voting for a long time.

- Try to get an absentee ballot in MA and your city/town Elections people will grill you about whether you will actually be out of town on election day. Most states, you get an absentee ballot, no questions asked.

- Only in MA (as far as I know) does the police detail scam extend into the polling place, slowing down the entire process, effectively denying the right to vote to people too busy to wait in line while the cop flips through the book one person at a time.

Wake up, Massachusetts. Your voting laws suck, and taking pride in keeping voting history secret, just because Trump, is not being on the right side of the issue.

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Where does the cop do polling checkins?

In Cambridge, there's a cop in the polling place, but he doesn't do anything.

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The cop sits next to the ballot box and checks off your name before you put your ballot in the box.

Contrary to the previous commenter, though, I've never noticed this to be a time-sucking procedure - maybe we get a better breed of cop at Roslindale polling stations. The one time I've ever noticed everything grind to a halt was a couple years ago, when I thought I'd put my ballot in the box, but the counter didn't increment by one and he had the entire precinct basically frozen until they could figure out where my ballot had gone (it had, in fact, gone into the box), which is what you'd want him or her to do.

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just not by cops. In my experience, it's a couple of old folks. They ask your address, then look it up, usually on the wrong page of their book, so you have to repeat your address. Then they look irritated, like it's your fault, and find the address. Then you have to tell them your name. If you also point to it in the book, you get that look again. I can't imagine that a cop would be slower at it than them.

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Just remember how localized everything is in Massachusetts. I've never had a problem with either in person or absentee voting. However, I wouldn't be surprised if a busybody volunteer or town clerk caused headaches.

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Where does it use the words "go screw"?

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It's implied.

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I don't understand voter suppression. You're a US Citizen. You bring your IDs to Town/City Hall to register to vote. You live in a particular district, you know where to vote & the days of the election. Just bring your IDs and you can vote.

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Here's an example of voter suppression: You require people to show a state ID to vote, then close all the DMV offices in the counties heavily populated by the group you don't want to vote, making it difficult or impossible for members of that group who don't have licenses to get an ID.

Say hi to the folks at home, Alabama (which eventually, sort of, re-opened those offices).

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Interesting, you figure all these people would get their IDs soon after moving to the area and not a few days before the election.

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To have such a calm life where nothing might get in the way of registering to vote as soon as you move.

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Also think of the newly-turned-18-year-olds, who want to vote, want to get a state ID to vote, but all the DMV and state offices that issue said IDs have been closed for 100 miles or more around.

And neither they, nor their parents have a car.

And it's a rural area, so they just can't hop on a bus or train.

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Getting an ID takes time and money. There is no need for it. Trump is a serial liar. He said there were 5 million illegal votes and he couldn't even provide proof of one single illegal vote. I still can't wrap my head around the fact that some states(the poor uneducated ones) voted for him.

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If it costs money, it's unconstitutional, because it amounts to a poll tax. These taxes have a long, ugly history of disenfranchising minority voters. It's just a coincidence that it's Republicans who are pushing these measures, because they aren't racists, oh, no.

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Gasp! Being a responsible citizen takes time and effort! The horrors of a civilized society!

I just love how for MONTHS we've been hearing about "Russian hacking our election yada yada yada" yet when it comes time to possibly improving voter integrity it becomes "suppression."

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Yes, because voter suppression is just that "suppression" and the alleged hacking is a totally other apple and/or orange.

In regards to being a responsible citizen, you should take some time and effort and catch up on voter suppression in the U.S.A.

https://www.aclu.org/issues/voting-rights/fighting-voter-suppression

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But the RMV in Wilmington refuses to accept an actual letter from the state sent to you at your address.

Go. fucking. figure.

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Those Republican consultants already leaked them. Don't know why they need the states to give them the records.

http://money.cnn.com/2017/06/19/technology/voter-data-leaked-online-gop/...

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Among the requests the commission is making of state election officials is that they provide information on all registered voters in the state, including their name, address, date of birth, party affiliation, and the last four digits of their social security number. The commission is also asking for information on voting history, any felony convictions, information on registration in another state, military status, and whether a voter is living overseas.

My understanding, and feel free to correct!

  • registered voter name: public record
  • registered voter address: public record
  • registered voter DOB: public record
  • registered voter party: public record
  • registered voter last 4 digits of SSN: NOT public record
  • registered voter voting history: public record (if voted, not for whom
  • registered voter felony convictions: not part of the voter file public record, but the list of felons with some information about each felon is public record. Without last for SSN, you can't assert with certainty that a convicted felon's name/DOB matching a voter's name/DOB means they're the same person.
  • registered voter also registered in another state: not part of the voter file public record
  • registered voter military status: not part of registered voter public record, although "occupation" is
  • registered voter mailing address: public record

In the mean time, while I'm glad that Secretary Galvin is not interested in helping the Republicans suppress legitimate voters, it sure would be nice if Democrats in Massachusetts would do more to enable folks to register and exercise their franchise. For example, same day registration would help, as would no excuses absentee ballots.

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(voter history) should not even considered to be part of the public record. Neither should be the choice of party ballot a voter is FORCED to accept to participate in a primary election.be part of the public record.

Voting is a RIGHT, not a mandate. Whether or not to cast a ballot, and whose party ballot is chosen, is NONE OF ANYBODY'S BUSINESS but the individual voter making those decisions.

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Article LXI.

The general court shall have authority to provide for compulsory voting at elections, but the right of secret voting shall be preserved.

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i don't know if it's public in MA, it may or may not be which I'm barely ok with, but I'm definitely not ok with it being public nationwide. no one needs my name, my address and which party I vote for on a regular basis. that's my choice and my vote and no one else's business.

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They should do a national gun owner database too

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In this case, what is good for the goose, ISN'T good for the gander..

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Its so gross that some states allow gun licenses for voting purposes but not state college IDs. Any crazy hick can get a gun license(unfortunately). Getting into college actually takes effort, time and money.

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Clearly you've never applied for college in MA vs. applying for a gun license in MA.

Just try it in Brookline and let me know how that works for you if your net income is less than 100k or you are a minority.

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the challenges in getting a firearm extend well into all income brackets and skin tones.

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The Constitution does not guarantee your right to vote. There are guidelines saying who can vote, and amendments guaranteeing that you cannot be denied the right to vote based on sex, race, age. But the protection is not nearly as strong as your right to bear arms.

In an ideal world, the government would not be allowed to deny the right to vote to anybody (including prisoners on death row). But even then you would still need some sort of ID system.

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As the Democrats desperately seek a message and continue to hemorrhage (1042 seats nationwide under Obama + 5 U.S. House seats since), it's issues like this that are repugnant to the average voter. As has been stated ad-nauseam, you can't buy a beer or a cigarette, obtain a library card or even adopt a pet without ID, but the Democrats insist on no ID for voting? Great stance. This is especially striking for political veterans who have seen races decided by a tiny percentage of votes, Phil Johnston vs. Bill Delahunt in MA, Norm Coleman vs. Al Franken (his winning margin found in trunk of a car) in MN, JFK vs. Nixon, Trump vs. Clinton and local races that sometimes come down to one vote.

President Trump and Republicans nationwide swept the last election on basic, common sense issues. Strong borders, strict foreign policy, fairness in trade, tax reform, taking another look at Global Warming "Climate Change" plus repeal and replace of disastrous Obamacare. It boggles the mind when Democrats stake out the most absurd position, be it voter ID, partial-birth abortion, destruction of the healthcare system, transgender bathrooms etc. Keep it up!

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I was beginning to worry about you Fishy - you were being a bit too sane lately.

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The I-Team found out that there are 4.75 million drivers licenses in Massachusetts. In 2013, about 4% needed a duplicate license. Around 186,020 duplicate licenses. There were about 887,319 individuals with EBT cards in 2013, on average more than 20% needed a replacement card. That’s 184,716 cards replaced. -- WWLP Springfield, MA

No worries anon, life is good! If one can get four "replacement" EBT cards to pass around (unlimited replacements under Deval), accountability is obviously a problem for the government, even though EBT requires ID. To suggest that voting without ID is sacrosanct is absurd.

As for state college ID's, I would be concerned. With the multitude of colleges here and the push to get students to vote Democrat, certainly the MA vote is skewed. Unless a newly registered voter tells officials they were previously registered elsewhere, there is little if any effort made (especially if voter came from out of state) to verify duplicates, so a person could easily vote in person or absentee in several places.

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People voting in Boston and then jetting off to Pennsylvania (on a flight paid for by George Soros, I'm sure) to vote there, and then it's off to, oh, let's see, how about Arkansas, after all, George is paying for it.

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two words:

ABSENTEE BALLOT

College students are notorious for voting in their home state and then voting in the state where they attend school. Hence why using student IDs for voter ID is a bad idea. No verification of actual residency.

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You just *know* this even though various organizations have been looking for it for ages?

Hokay.

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I know every four years I like to try and move into a new housing situation at least once a month for a whole year so that I can fill out a dozen ballots for 12 states at least three months before the election so that I can get all my absentee fraud in on time...

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No need to physically get in a plane when the US Postal Service will fly your absentee ballot to your home state for 49 cents while you vote again in Boston, then take a bus to NH and vote with same day registration. I don't think the 85 year-old warden at the polls in Brighton is investigating. Again, Democrats should keep the "no ID" stance, it's so ridiculous that average voters are turned off. As for rural residents unable to obtain an ID, how do they buy cars, tractors and beer?

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You just cracked the code!

Imagine if hundreds of thousands of people did this!! You might actually influence an election in THREE whole places!

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n/t

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I mean, if I were ruler of the world, I could have made Gore president, too, but I'm not, and your scenario didn't happen, either.

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Ah yes. Like Tiffany Trump, Darth Bannon, Menudochin, etc.

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He's got a UMass ID, and no license.

He isn't unusual in the least.

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How did your son get into UMass without a government ID? They took his word for it? Wasn't this a scandal years ago with college students with the potential to become professional basketball players paying other students to take classes for them? I can't imagine any college, not even UMass, admitting someone without proof of identity.

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Government ID isn't only for drivers.

There are State IDs.

There are State Liquor IDs

There are these things called Passports - but we've tried to explain that to you before.

High School ID is also government ID if you went to a public high school.

Social Security Card is also a government ID.

Then there is a certified record of live birth, school transcripts, and other government verification of identity.

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We're another member of the "kid without a state-issued ID who got into UMass" club. And she got a state scholarship, too (thanks, Mitt!).

I know, it's shocking, but she didn't have to show her papers to some jack-booted functionary or anything and yet we're still living off the public teat, bwa-ha-ha!

How do they know we're legit? Maybe it was the transcripts from her high school, located in a Massachusetts community. Maybe the recommendation letter from her guidance counselor, who is registered with whatever licensing division handles teacher certification in the great Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

And maybe it's the document we probably signed somewhere on which we declared we were, in fact, Massachusetts residents, under penalty of law. Yes, UMass and the state do care about such things - the scholarship she got is only open to Massachusetts residents, and UMass charges out of state residents significantly more in tuition (which helps subsidize her education, so we're very grateful for all the foreign and out-of-state students for that, in addition for the way they help show her civilization doesn't really end at 128).

The key thing is there are other ways for people to prove residency that don't require their data in some government database.

Note: AFTER she got admitted and sent in her acceptance, I took her down to the local RMV to get an official state ID, because we thought it might be a good idea for those times when she might need to show ID for some reason. ONE OF WHICH IS NOT GOING TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS, for Christ's sake.

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No wonder why disastrous UMass is in budget crisis and the Boston campus is literally collapsing. Watch your head in the garage. Are they now really admitting students without ID while claiming to charge more for foreign and out of state students? Who would ever admit to being foreign or out of state if there is no verification? Terrible P/C system with obvious consequences. Like others, maybe she can hire someone to take her classes since apparently UMass has no ID of her.

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You realize that UMass Boston is different from UMass Amherst and different from UMass Lowell and UMass Dartmouth.

Right?

And, as we ALREADY EXPLAINED a driver's license is NOT the only form of identification available in the Commonwealth or in the country! See list, above.

Which is probably not going to work since you don't even know how passports and social security numbers work.

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As has been stated ad-nauseam, you can't buy a beer or a cigarette, obtain a library card or even adopt a pet without ID

It's been repeated ad nauseum, and it's been irrelevant every time. There's no constitutional right to do any of those things.

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People have a constitutional right to "bear arms" yet you have to furnish an ID (gun license approved by the state) to purchase a gun. Your point is?

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Even in the Heller decision, the Supreme Court did not outlaw all licensing requirements for guns. You might want to look it up.

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In most places you aren't carded for smokes or booze if you look older then 21 or in a small town where they know you anyway. The people who don't have IDs are generally those who live in rural places where having one isn't needed or are disabled such that going to a state office is not trivial.

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Since you told us about your friend in the Philippines who gave you the inside scoop on Globe subscription rates - tell us again about how many subscriptions had been canceled - can't remember - was it hundreds? Thousands or millions?

Oh yeah - while discussing acts of veracity - when was it again that you had your passport stamped at Reagan airport after deembarking from a domestic flight?

There,s more we could talk about but I don't want to tax you too much.

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Dave, the lovely Globe worker in Manila, Philippines (fake Dorchester phone number) would only say, "many, many" canceled the day of the fake Globe front page predicting a Trump stock market crash (record highs) nuclear war, concentration camps etc. She couldn't give a specific number as I was on hold for an hour and many more were holding, impossible to tally. The media "critics" won't ask how many canceled that day. You'll have to read through the lines with the many subsequent Globe layoffs and sale of their longtime HQ (their only asset) and a move to rental property. Now a slow death. Sad.

The Reagan passport stamp is available if you know the right people. Do you think if a foreign flight was forced to land there they'd make it take off again due to lack of stamp? It was great to dine with some new friends from Reagan attending the Tall Ships in June.

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The Reagan passport stamp is available if you know the right people. Do you think if a foreign flight was forced to land there they'd make it take off again due to lack of stamp?

Not sure what country you live in, but it isn't the United States.

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A table/chart of Roll Call Votes taken in Public Meetings of Boston City Council by topic would be better than the City Clerks Office website at https://www.cityofboston.gov/cityclerk/rollcall/

The table/chart of Roll Call Votes could be made available at the Boston Open Data website https://data.boston.gov/

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