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A press release, dated 11 May, posted to the White House Web site (archived copy) announces (all links and party affiliations were added by the submitter):
[...] the issuance of an executive order forming the bipartisan Presidential Commission on Election Integrity. The President also named [Republican] Vice President Mike Pence as Chairman and Kansas Secretary of State [Republican] Kris Kobach as Vice-Chair of the Commission.
Five additional members were named to the bipartisan commission today:
Connie Lawson [Republican], Secretary of State of Indiana
Bill Gardner [Democratic], Secretary of State of New Hampshire
Matthew Dunlap [Democratic], Secretary of State of Maine
Ken Blackwell [Republican], Former Secretary of State of Ohio
Christy McCormick, Commissioner, Election Assistance Commission
[...]
The Commission on Election Integrity will study vulnerabilities in voting systems used for federal elections that could lead to improper voter registrations, improper voting, fraudulent voter registrations, and fraudulent voting. The Commission will also study concerns about voter suppression, as well as other voting irregularities. The Commission will utilize all available data, including state and federal databases.
Secretary Kobach, Vice-Chair of the Commission added: "As the chief election officer of a state, ensuring the integrity of elections is my number one responsibility. The work of this commission will assist all state elections officials in the country in understanding, and addressing, the problem of voter fraud."
Additional Commission members will be named at a later time. It is expected the Commission will spend the next year completing its work and issue a report in 2018.
According to Wikipedia's biography of Mr. Kobach (citation style changed by submitter):
Kobach has come to prominence over his hardliner views on immigration, as well as his calls for greater voting restrictions and a Muslim registry.[cite][cite][cite] Kobach regularly makes false or unsubstantiated claims about the extent of voter fraud in the United States.[cite]
As Secretary of State of Kansas, he has implemented some of the strictest voter ID legislation in the nation and has fought to remove nearly 20,000 properly registered voters from the state's voter rolls.[cite] After considerable investigation and prosecution, Kobach secured six convictions for voter fraud; all were cases of double voting and none would have been prevented by voter ID laws.
additional coverage:
- Washington Post
- ABC News
- Chicago Tribune (editorial)
- Los Angeles Times
- Atlanta Journal Constitution blog
- New York Times
- Kansas City Star
- The Nation
- American Civil Rights Union press release
- Rhode Island Public Radio
- Project Veritas
- Observer
- ABC News
- Fox News (archived copy)
- KCUR-FM
- NBC News
related stories:
Kansas Secretary of State Finally Convicts an Immigrant of a Voting Irregularity
Former Colorado GOP chairman charged with voter fraud
Hundreds of Texans may have voted improperly
Donald Trump is Filling Out His Transition Team
Hacking Voter Registration Data in Indiana
Study Finds Texas Voter Photo ID Requirement Discourages Turnout
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:34PM (4 children)
Is it really necessary to add party affiliation? It looks like all republocrats except for Christy McCormick, who may actually be a normal person.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by kaszz on Sunday May 14 2017, @05:46PM (2 children)
Noted, the Libertarian Party, Green Party, Constitution Party, Better for America, Evan McMullin, and Mindy Finn are missing..
Maybe US should be named a binocracy?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @06:02PM
Whaddabout Vermin Supreme???
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 14 2017, @06:14PM
No, the US is a binosaurus, soon to be extinct...
(Score: 2) by butthurt on Monday May 15 2017, @03:54AM
> republocrats
The commission is advertised as "bipartisan." In your post and especially in the word I quoted, I think you're trying to convey the idea that the Republican and Democratic parties are basically alike. I can understand why you hold that opinion; however, I perceive differences between the parties in regard to the topic that this commission is about.
Ms. McCormick is a civil servant, not a politician. I simply copied the affiliations of the others from their biographies on Wikipedia.
Wikipedia's biography of Mr. Dunlap, one of the Democrats on the commission, says that he
[...] directed the implementation of Maine's Military and Overseas Voter Empowerment (MOVE) Act, allowing military personnel and others abroad secure and prompt access to the ballot.
So he acted to enfranchise a group of people who could be expected to favour the Republican Party. That appears fair-minded.
Of the seven members of the commission, three are Indianan politicians: Mr. Pence, Mr. Kobach and Ms. Lawson. Indiana is the 16th most populous state. It's easy to predict that the recommendations of the commission are likely to be modelled upon practices used in Indiana.
Wikipedia's biography of Mr. Blackwell says:
On April 4, 2006, the Columbus Dispatch reported that Blackwell "owned stock [83 shares, down from 178 shares purchased in January 2005] in Diebold, a voting-machine [and ATM] manufacturer, at the same time his office negotiated a deal" with the company. After discovering the stock ownership, Blackwell promptly sold the shares at a loss. He attributed the purchase to an unidentified financial manager at Credit Suisse First Boston who he said had, without his knowledge, violated his instructions to avoid potential conflict of interest.
-- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Blackwell#Diebold_controversies [wikipedia.org]
A top Republican election official also says a Diebold operative told him he made a $50,000 donation to Blackwell's "political interests."
[...] The revelations could have a huge impact on the state whose dubiously counted electoral votes gave George W. Bush a second term. Diebold was the vendor in three Ohio counties in 2004. Because of Blackwell's effort, 41 counties used Diebold machines in Ohio's highly dubious 2005 election, and now 47 counties will use Diebold touchscreen voting machines in the May 2006 primary [...]
In 2005, while he owned Diebold stock, Blackwell converted nearly half Ohio's counties to Diebold equipment.
-- http://freepress.org/article/shocking-diebold-conflict-interest-revelations-secretary-state-further-taint-ohios-electoral [freepress.org]