Our Voice: Voter fraud commission should let it go

The ill-conceived federal plan to gather voter information from every state has, thankfully, been suspended.

After legal challenges surfaced in response to the data grab, President Donald Trump’s voter fraud commission told states on Monday to wait to comply with its recent request for extensive voter information.

It is a relief state election officials can, for now, stop wasting their time on this ridiculous issue. Although it’s too bad it took filing lawsuits to halt the process.

Judges are busy enough with legitimate concerns. This is an unnecessary attempt by Trump to support his baseless claim of widespread voter fraud in the 2016 election and explain why he lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton.

Washington Secretary of State Kim Wyman rightly called the allegation “ludicrous on its face.”

Trump said between 3 million and 5 million illegal votes were cast in last year’s presidential election, yet he provided no evidence to back that up

He won the Electoral College vote and that’s the one that counts — it gave him the presidency. Trying to prove he should have won the popular vote as well looks like he’s searching for a way to boost his ego.

Trump created the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity in May, with Vice President Mike Pence at the helm and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach as vice chairman.

Kobach told CNN that the commission only wants public voter information — but the last four digits of Social Security numbers and driver license numbers were included. along with voter names, addresses, birth dates, party affiliations, military service records and voting histories.

Nearly all state election officials have balked at releasing such sensitive and private information. Only Arkansas has complied so far, but federal officials say that information will be deleted now that the commission is facing legal challenges.

Several studies have shown that — contrary to what Trump thinks — widespread voter fraud does not exist. The Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan organization at New York University School of Law, examined every federal election between 2000 and 2014 and found only 31 credible instances out of more than 1 billion votes cast.

Wyman’s response to the data request was diplomatic. She said, “As with any request for public records, we are required to comply pursuant to state law regardless of who is making the request.”

She added that she “doesn’t get to pick which laws I follow and which ones I don’t,” but would only share information that is already available to the public.

We think she handled the situation exactly right.

Fortunately, it now looks like she won’t have to share voter registration data any time soon.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), a watchdog group, and two civil liberties groups have filed lawsuits to prevent the commission from holding its first scheduled meeting next week, according to the Washington Post.

EPIC officials argued that the commission’s attempt to gather the entire country’s voter information in one database exposes every registered voter to risk, the Post story said.

Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law filed lawsuits claiming the commission is breaking government transparency laws.

Even before the legal challenges surfaced, 44 states declined to provide all the voter data requested.

Commission officials should forget this outrageous attempt to collect private information on every registered voter in the country.

They are looking for a problem that isn’t there.

This story was originally published July 11, 2017 at 12:20 PM with the headline "Our Voice: Voter fraud commission should let it go."