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Today. Topics included Voter Registration procedures and the civic value and duty of voting and cyberSecurity Issues of voter information. I will call the item back to order. We are continuing with item number 4 in our agenda. The first part is, just a restatement of the mission that is laid out in the executive order of may 11th, 2017. Its the executive order 13799, members of the commission to have a copy and of course, it is available on the white house website. Ill just read it, section 3 of the executive order states, mission, the Commission Shall consistent with applicable law, study the registration and voting processes used in federal elections, the commission will be solely be advisory and submit a report that has the following. A, those laws, rules, policies, activities, strategies and practices that enhance the american peoples confidence in the integrity of the voting processes used in federal elections. B, those laws, rules, policies, activities, strategies, and practices that under mine the american peoples confidence in the integrity of the voting processes used in flem elections and c, those vulnerability in voting systems and practices used in federal elections that could lead to improper Voter Registrations and improper voting, including fraudulent Voter Registrations and fraudulent voting. Are there any comments on the mission . Seeing none, we will move to the bylaws and operating procedures. We have not adopted any bylaws yet, that is our next order of business. Theres presented to the commission a proposal for the by laws of the president ial Advisory Commission on election integrity. The proposal is a, is pretty closely mirrors the bylaws that were provided by the gsa, right. Gsa, has, sort of, prototype of bylaws as many people may know, theres approximately conditions at any given time. Many of thes are ongoing. President ial commissions are more rare, they only represent about 4 of that thousand. But, they all have bylaws and so we started with the model and have staff suggested minimal changes to them. This is the proposed bylaws. These are the proposed bylaws and at this point, im hoping that members of the commission had a chance to look at the bylaws. And next point to be appropriate would be a motion to adopt if theres one. So moved. Second. And theres a motion and a second, and actually, one of the items in the bylaws is that we dont require a second, but at this point, we have not adopted them yet. So mr. Blackwell and mr. Adams moved and seconded respectively. Now the issues before the commission, is there any discussion of the bylaws . All right, they seem straight forward to me as well. Is there a well, since theres no discussion, i guess we can go ahead and call the question. The question is called, all those in favor of adopting the bylaws say eaye. Opposed nay. Bylaws have been adopted unanimously. The next topic is a forward looking question and that is what topics might the commission wish to address in future meetings. I took the liberty of just putting together some ideas on paper, just as a starting point. And thats all this is. And i will pass these out to people, and i will read them in to the record and again, this is nothing more than my thoughts on a topic and would invite any additions or deletions or we can scrap it entirely. Just laying on out of the the topic for the commission to think about. I wrote down five possible ways to divide the subject matter. One would be accuracy of vote r rolls including people that moved from one state to another, noncitizens who may have gotten on the voter rolls one way or the other, deceased who are on the voter rolls and felons that are excluded depend ant on the state laws. Second topic, fraudulent or improper voting. Scope of the problem and strategies to address the problem t idea being that that theres so many different ways of dividing up the issue, you know, theres activities that occur on voting day. Theres activities that might occur in a early voting stage where a state has voting by mail. And then theres activities involving the registration process, which may be well before voting occurs. Then the third general topic was voting by mail. And that is a wide variety of subtopics. Issues involving threats to the integrity of voting by mail, we have a hybrid system in our state, where i think most states have it now, where you have voting on election day and voting by mail proceeding the election day. We now have several states that have gone to all mail balloting too. That could be wrapped in to the topic. Fourth topic i just thought of is one that we may want to address and we certainly do not have to. Its cybersecurity regarding state voter data bases all of the state and county officials here have access to these data bases and each state takes steps to protect them against, efforts to hack or break in to the Voter Registration data bases that is one topic we may want to tackle. Next is voter tim additi r v intimidation and any topics that people want to discuss. With that, just sort of a thought paper to get people started, i entertain any discussion. One of the more pro found statements to come out, was the importance of one single vote. We have 31 of the 40 counties in equipment, where voting is executed. It would be interesting to catalog, across the country, how many initiatives, whether its for hospital, school levees, candidate elections are determined by one ballot. The reason i say that, is when we look at the big numbers like 5 million, 6 million, 7 million. You know, it is easy for somebody to dismiss it. But when we drive home the importance of every single, legal vote cast and the integrity of the ballot box, we can show people the consequence of one illegal a ballot that dilutes a legal ballot. Theres some states that can readily get us the numbers. We dont necessarily have to go back to the, you know, the first recording of states history. We can take a period of time, over the last two cycles or just to get us a snapshot, so that we can help drive home the point to the american voter, that the single ballot count, that is what this is about, the single voters voice is the focus. And we want to fake sure theres no voice being negated. We tried it in kansas for the purposes of a legislative hearing on a bill that was in front of the legislature to see how many elections were decided by a small number of votes and it was amazing how there was not a cental repository of that in our state and the county election officer for the largest state, johnson county, came to the commission and said over a ten year period, heres what we have. And i was astonished by the number of elections that were dead ties or decided by fewer than ten votes. But he had to look through his day that that was not easily available in a place where you know where to go to online. So, i think it would be fascinating information to have. I think it may be harder to obtain than you think. Chair, we believe p we probably cant get every jurisdiction, based on personnel and time and money, but i think we can get a Representative Group to drive home the point. And again, as the Vice President said, one person, one vote, that is the bedrock upon which our democracy is based. And a lot of decisions are made by one, two, three votes. Yes, mr. Vice chair, you know, really, until i was contacted about potentially serving on this commission and read things in the media, i just assumed that someone could only be registered in one state. I really thought that was the law of different states, quite frankly and to find out that people are registered, we will sea state we will say state aa Vacation Home in state b, that they can be registered in both states and potentiatentially vo one state and go to a resort state and vote another ballot. I dont know if it happens or not. It seems like to had me, it would be i would like for us to discuss, a recommendation to the president that someone can only be registered in one state. If you have a Vacation Home, great, vote an absentee ballot or by mail in your home state. I dont see where anyone needs to be registered in one more than one state. I would like to see us discussing that. I can add something there, the interstate cross system check, all those here are participants and its easy to get registered in the new state, but its harder than one might think that deregister the person, because that is the last thing they think of when they are moving, i better call the county i used to live in, and send them a written piece of paper saying, i am no longer wishing to vote there, because im moving. Its a big problem and its worthy of discussion. Two things, one on secretary blackwells recommendation to get as many states to provide us information on elections in the recent years, perhaps in the last ten years that have been decided by a small number of votes. I didn i think its a good idea. A great example of this, im sure the secretaries know, secretary yusted of ohio, just a couple of years ago put out press releases in which he had done that. He had gone through and found, numerous, particularly local election hads in ohio that were decided by one vote or by ties. So, that information is out there. On the second issue that judge king raised that, that is a very important issue, we know from the very studies that have been done, including the pugh study that theres a lot of people who registered in more than one state. Many of those are probably errors. You know, someone moved, they didnt notify the prior state. Part of what this commission has to do is try to come up with recommendations that will improve, help states improve the communications between the states, so they can find these individuals. But, what prior studies have not done is taken the second step. Yes, they have looked at Voter Registration lists and found individuals registered in multiple states. We dont know how many of those are errors. Simple administrative, innocent errors and how many of those are individuals taking advantage of it to illegally vote in more than one state. And the second half of that kind of study that has not really been done, is getting also the voting histories to check that. And the data base that we have has examples of individuals who were prosecuted for voting in more than one state. And thats certainly a problem. We need to look at how big of a problem that is, and what can be done to prevent it. I would add, not that im going comment on every comment here. But the crosscheck data base, sends to the participating states what are possible cases of double voting. We say possible, because every match is a potential false positive. Further investigation is always warranted, in the last two years, my state obtained eight convictions in double voting issues. Its not complicated to obtain the information. Everything is that there has to be further investigation to make sure its not a false positive. Yes . I have two or three additional topics, maybe they fit in elsewhere, and of course, there will probably be more topics that we spread to as we start the worker. I think we should look to the president alex active order, the causes for the lack of Voter Participation and confidence in our elections. Im not sure how we collect that data or get witness testimony the on that. We have a low Participation Rate among democracies in the world and i would like to know why. And then we should look at automatic Voter Registration. A number of states are taking up automatic Voter Registration, several have passed it and put it in place. That raises questions about the accuracy of the voting rolls. How this is all playing out y and how it will change the process across the country. And i would like to also look at, i dont know if its appropriate or not, how voter crimes are identified and prosecuted in the country. Resources are scarce and its not followed up on. I could be wrong about that, but i know its hard to identify voter fraud when its happening. I know from personal experience in seeing it in person, myself, that it is not a myth. I think we should identify and look at how we prosecute these crimes in the country. On the list, you have cybersecurity regarding state data bases listed. When i thought about the purpose of the commission, i thought we should probably not go there, theres so many other people looking at this. The timing of that and just the cooperation of the eoc, the dojs, i is have an opportunity this month, yet, to visit the facility in albany, new york, we are all learning more and more about it. I dont think it would be harmful if we put some of the information we are gaining in one spot, so we can maybe suggest best practices, regarding information sharing. And security levels. Those kind of things. I might chime in on that point, secretary lawson, the one hesitation i had in really, a hesitation, that i have in think background the cybersecurity topic is some of the federal secretaries of of state here may have had briefings in your respective states that are either sensitive or classified. And you know, the briefing will be about, were there any attempts to breech the states registration rules and so, some of the discussions are themselves sensitive. So, for example, if the commission were to say, well, we have an expert in public testimony saying well, here, here are the things that the states are doing well. If you want to break in to a states voter rolls here are the weaknesses, which is exactly what the sensitive discussions are about. Then, we, in a way, have sort of given a road map to those that might want to breech the states secured voter rolls. So, my concern on that topic is that we might have to go in to a closed session for part of the meeting. But maybe that should not deter us. You know, that may be just what we have to do. And its my understanding, i guess this can be verified, theres another president ial commission looking at cyber vulnerabilities across the board. I think its being chaired by mayor giuliani. There are times when we can be read in to certain conversations, whether they be, you know, confidential meetings. And i think we should explore it. The reality is while some of us had top secret clearance before, as commissioners we dont have top secret clearance. But, there are people who are concerned about various threats that would fall under the umbrella of information that is confidential. So, i think we need to explored administratively ways that we can be read in to pertinent aspects of our exploration, and we also have to be willing to understand that sometimes we wont be able to go in to that lane, you know, with our examination. Obviously, as my job as commissioner in the elections systems commission. We are working on looking in to these issues and i believe theres a role for us to play here, maybe not to the detail where we have to you know, reveal methodologies and things of that nature, but look at the realties of how feasible it is, a bad actor, to get in our Voter Registration systems and manipulate voter information. I know we have heard the stories of 21 states and in some cases 31 states in the press being somewhat hacked, the department of Homeland Security cant define hack, they said that they would have to give us 21 different definitions of that. But i think its worth looking at if voter information can be manipulated if the systems are penetrated. Hopefully we would not have to get in to deep Security Issues but i think its worth exploring. You are right, commissioner mccormick. 2015 the office of Personnel Management was hacked and 25 million of employees had expose er to potential breech of information. We have to operate in the real world, theres real threats and vulnerabilities and we cannot be limited in terms of what is being done to protect the american people, whether its their Social Security numbers. Their financial situation. Or the integrity of the ballot. Theres real threats. Other commissions and get a bead on this, i think we have to, we have to press to see just how far we can go. Its important to our work. I also think that theres positive statements that can come out of this, that is, that our election system is the centralized, our tabulation machines are not connect to the internet theres positive statements that we can make to show that the systems are not as vulnerable as was thought in the past. In my opening statement, i of course made reference to funding for upgrades for counties and states for the voter machines. Heres the reality of this. Ive been there on election day and night when the machines are not working properly and you have to bring in other machines and thankfully we are a large county and we have got the Financial Resources to, and we have got access machines, but theres a lot of counties in the nation who dont have the resources, and its all, and we can talk about, elections a lot, but if people cant vote because the machines dont work, then we have a massive, massive problem. And we have got to address that. We have got, in my opinion, we have got to address funding in a recommendation by the president to congress, lets do another funding like we did for hava, in 2002, and states and counties all across the nation used that money to purchase Voting Machines. So, here, what we have got now, is we have got 13 and 15yearold Voting Machines, and you have got Voting Machines that dont work. You have got these machines need parts. And we have got these counties and states we have got to have the funds, otherwise, you know, we are missing the big picture if we dont make sure that we have the machines that are state on the art and work, and work properly. Thank you, mr. Vice chair. I have been paying close attention to what is being said and it a fascinating discussion and you know, i think, i know what we do in maine, some of the discussion around what commissioner king just referred to, with the voting machine break downs, we dont have Voting Machines in maine. We use optical scan tabulator, but it happens that they break down. And because, we are a paper ballot state, you know, our town clerks always have option of hauling out of the old ballot box and use it until the machine is fixed. One of the things that comes to my mind is the issue of chain of custody. And the discussion around fraudulent activity or the illegal activity, and that boils down to the overt act of committing a crime. And thats a little bit tougher to discern, in my prior life in public service, i spent six years as care of our fish and wild life committee. And one of the discussions came from our Supreme Court was how do you define the illegal activity. Of course, its been illegal since 1914 in maine to jack deer at night. You can have pursuant to the Supreme Court, you can have the gun, the ammunition and a light and be there at three in the morning. Its not until you shine the tree liner, and fire the shot that you committed a crime. And you know, when we had a disputed election, just a few years ago, on the senate district, over 25,000 ballots cast and there was a seven vote margin. And theres a recount. And i showed the recount as it i got started and my intrepid deputy, judy flynn, she goes to a lot of your states and an expert on the issues. I walked in and she said, this one town, the town of long island had made a mistake and they missed counting dwun balan counting 21 ballots. When we were all said and done, the margin flipped by 14 votes, so those 21 ballots made a difference. The person that was winning is now losing the election. The lawyer said, we want to check the incoming voter lists that matches up the number of people that voted versus the number of ballots cast. No problem, we get in on monday morning and wouldnt you know the 21 ballots were not counted for and that changed the dynamic very quickly. I can describe with some authority the chain of custody from the time it leaves a Printing Press to being sealed in a ballot box. When we identified it pretty articulately, its like where did the 21 ballots come from. You could cut the air with a knife and it went to a special senate committee. We discovered in the recount. That is manned by a republican and a democrat, they had let them from a prior lot from another table and mixed them in with another lot and counted them twice. So there was no fraud. Julie and i would talk on the phone at night. So, part of, you know, i think what we can maybe ask of folks is how their chain s of custody work to help alay the fears that something may have gone wrong in the election. If you have a accountability standard, you cannot tell how someone voted, but you know, who showed up. You know how many ballots were issues. Ing, that is easier for a paper ballot state like the state of maine. I think its a question worth asking. It helps to answer the questions and alays some of the fears. Mr. Vice chair, we have been talking about general principals, will this be an appropriate time to talk about other data that i think we need to get . We are mapping out places that the commission may go. So to speak. I think we have our asked for Voter Registration and voter history from the states. And i think part of inquiry in to deciding how accurate are the voter rolls and what can be done to improve them. Its also inquired of the state, what data bases do they consult when they are verifying the accuracy of Voter Registration information and for example, in counties in county governments are they accessing for example, county tax records. The reason for doing that is of course, because its illegal to register to vote in a commercial address. You are supposed to register to vote at a residence address. And by consulting tax records, county governments can quickly tell if someone is illegally registering in a commercial address. Are they accessing other data bases department of vital records. Corrections departments. Dmv records. And then we need to inquire, those are all state records. Are they consulting federal data bases for example, are they, are they doing data comparisons with the Social Security master index. Death records and not just are they doing it and how often are they doing it . If they are only doing it once every five years, its inadequate. If they are doing it more frequently, it may be adequate. Theres also other data base and i know other states are not consulting and those that are, are running in to huge problems with red tape and by that, i mean, for example, the data bases at the department of Homeland Security that have information on all noncitizens who illegally are in the United States and information on all individuals who are illegally in the United States who have been detained and a record has been created. That is obviously an important issue to know whether, one, they are accessing the data bases and whether they were able to do it easily or if they run in to red tape with the federal government. I think we need to gather data from other sources. What other information was out there that could help states. I will give you examples of what i mean. More than a decade ago, the Accountability Office did a report, that is in which they looked at what other kind of information is available that could help Election Officials with the Voter Registration list. They checked with several Federal District courts droos country in one particular Federal District court, they were told that in a twoyear period, a certain percentage of the individuals called for jury duty have been excused for being noncitizens. Now, the federal court clerks get their jury lists from the voter, local state Voter Registration lists. Well, we need to get that data, i think, from all the Federal District courts around the country, that will give us an idea of how many potential noncitizens are being called for jury duty for federal courts who have been taken from the Voter Registration lists. We united to find out, and i think the answer is no, they do not do it. Do the federal court clerks, when someone is excused of jury duty, because they are not a citizen, do they send that information back to the state and local voting officials. So they can investigate if that is someone that needs to be taken off the roll. And second, do they forward that information to the u. S. Attorney in that district because it is a felony under federal law for a noncitizen to register to vote. My understanding is they are not doing that. We also need to find out from the u. S. Attorneys offices all across the country. Whether had they are complying with a provision in the national Voter Registration act which requires, u. S. Attorneys, to send information about felony convictions, obtained in federal court to state Election Officials so those state Election Officials in states that take away the right to vote, and whether you are convicted of a felony conviction, whether they have the information available. My understanding is that many of the u. S. Attorneys offices across the country pay no attention to this federal requirement. Theres also information in the department of homeland securities files, on individuals who applied for citizenship. One of the questions on the Application Form for naturalization is a question that is specifically asked, have you registered or voted in elections . We need to know from dhs, and we need data on those files. How many files do they have of individuals, noncitizen, who answer yes to that question. What do they do with that information . My understanding is that they do not forward that information to the u. S. Justice department for investigation and possible prosecution. Theres all these urs sos of federal day that there, that nothing is being done about, is not being sent to Election Officials and it is not being forwarded to the u. S. Justice department for investigation and possible prosecution. And those are all sources of data that i think this commission needs to make inquiries about. I will just comment on that, many commissioners know the department of justice, sent a letter to the states within the last month or so, asking about efforts to keep the, maintain the voter rolls and keep them accurate and that, the response is from the states may include some of the information you just requested about what effort states are making to verify the accuracy of the voter rolls. And with respect to noncitizens who on a jury form, a juror request form. Or summons, state im not a u. S. Citizen, therefore i cannot participate in the jury. Im certain that the federal courts are not seconding that information about this person on the voter rolls said he cannot participate. He is a noncitizen. I know in the state judiciary, i can state my experience in kansas. We looked at that and our state courts have a similar form. You can decline jury duty if you are not a u. S. Citizen and they were not providing it to the secretary of States Office and the county clerks that maintain the voter rolls at the county level. So we had to pass a special law, just to order the courts to periodically give us that information so we could compare it. And thats how we discovered the 128 noncitizens who are registered in kansas that we know of specifically was through that. But we were not getting it until we asked for it and finally had to pass a statute to get it and im certain we are not getting it yet from the federal courts. So, you mentioned that theres several federal data bases and there may be information already in the hands of the federal government and if theres no objection from the commission, i think that might be one task that we can delegate to staff is in the interim between now and the next meeting and next meeting. Start trying to collect whatever data there is, that is already in possession of the federal government that may be helpful to us. I just would like to point out, since 2012, the National Association of secretaries of state has had a resolution asking the federal government for assistance and providing the data that they have, so that we can keep our list more up to date, and in fact, that was adopted, readopted the ten go ahead of july, 2017. National association is aware of that and would appreciate any information that we could get from the federal government to held had us keep our lists clean. And i personally see this commission as a valuable opportunity to hopefully make a reality what nas has been asking for, for many years. Bipartisan desire, please, federal government, you have information that will help us keep our voter rolls clean. Could we use that information or could you make it available to us in some . And more often than not, its my experience, the answer is silence we are not going to answer your request, or if we answer your request, it will be not realliment you may get a slifr of information, but not information that will be helpful. I hope this information can a, look at the information that the federal government already possesses and b, perhaps recommend protocols after the commission is disbabd nded, abo how the federal government can be a helpful partner in keeping the voter rolls clean and up to date. We have at least one state in the country that has no Voter Registration. And i would think it would be interesting to hear from that state, how they run their elections. How do they handle no registration . We have a number of states and a growing number of states that are going online registration, i think it would be interesting to look at that as well, and see the impact of Voter Registration on how that has changed the registration environment across the country as well. I assume you are referring to north dakota . Yes, north dakota. Well, we have increased almost 4,000 voters over the past year that we have been doing online and dmv, its an opt out, currently. If you go to the dmv and register your drivers license, you have to opt us, if you dont want to register to vote, on july 19, they are going switch to an opt out. So, if you dont make a choice, where you dont say, no, i dont want to register to vote, it will automatically register you to vote. We have increased the voter rolls probably 4,000 of the past year. Mainly because of the dmv. Has that increased Voter Participation and turnout . No. No. I think that is something worth looking at. I do think its a benefit, because three years ago when i west to t when i went to the schools. The marriage high schools have 400 graduating class. We registered hundreds of students to vote before the election cycle. We did it a couple of months ago, we registered two students, because everyone that we are getting through the dmv is a 1999 date of birth. As they get their drivers license, they are registering to vote. So, yeah. Is that going to increase voter turn out . We have to verify every address. The we figured out data comparison is not always correct. We have people that change names because they got married. Only by crosschecks have we been able to determine that they were duplicate voters in the system. Those are other things that we have to figure out of the best way to handle to make sure that we dont have duplicates. I think that we would accomplish a lot if we could come to terms with why for 40 years, states and federal government have been doing all these things to try to make it easy for people involved and it has not happened. When nvra, when that passed, people did predict that it was not going to have anything to do with the turnout. But those promoting it said, oh, no, this is once we get people on the list, they will come out and vote, they will come out and vote. Well, what happened six years later . It was because of what the federal government did within nvra, people were not showing up to the polls and were being sent home because they were not on the list, and saying that we registered and then they said, we registered in disney world, some group said they would put it in the mail. So, all of the problem that we saw in florida, put aside the punch card machines. Showing, people showing up to vote shows the federal law that opened the process of registration. And it did not get more people to vote. Automatic Voter Registration is not going to get more people to vote. It is the will of the voter. It is the value that the voter sees, in not actually doing it. That is the key to getting more people to vote. So, after we had nvra, we ended up with help america vote act. The federal government gives the states 2. 9 billion. I have had reports that over half of that money spent on types of voting equipment has already been destroyed, thrown away because of you judge have said, these voter machines that are ten, 12 years old are now antiquated, i can bring you to a polling place in my state that has a voting machine that was patented in 1890 and they are still using the voting machine. And so at the time of help america vote passed, a lot of states decided, end the money. Spend millions and millions dollars on state of the art voting equipment. Without thinking about is it possible that this voting equipment is state of the art, or in five or ten years or in 12 years could be worthless . And are we going to keep doing that . Every ten or 12 years because equipment is worthless . And you look at the number of states that have done that, and then have gone back to paper. Like maryland did a year ago. Went back, to paper. The old way. So, the biggest contribution i think that we can make is we could answer that question in some way of what is the will to vote . And if the equation has been up side down on the seesaw, all about ease, all about ease. But there are professors now, across the country, more and more of them, that are talking about how important the confidence is that a person has, a pe potential voter has in the process. Is that the key that will get us to the will . Because if something is of value, you know that we are all going go out of our way to get it or take advantage of it. If its of value to us. And its the same thing with the voting process. Its what is that value . Now, and professors have told me this, that voting is fragile anyway because so many in the country see their vote as really nothing. Because theres millions, we have several of us talked about this, theres millions and millions votes so our votes are nothing. But as commissioner blackwell had said, we break that down, and the local level. There are elections all the time that are being decided. I had 11 recounts that ended in a tie and these were thousands and thousands of votes. So, i would then really like to look at if as we know, the polls have shown, i saw the gallop poll a week from the president ial election. Why are so many people in the country actually saying that. Then there was a second poll. And for the first time going back six, eight president ial elections, after the election theres a study that i have seen within the last month. That when people are asked afterwards, after the president ial election going back that many of them. You feel your vote was counted accurately, do you feel that the process itself was secure and had integrity . This is first president ial election that the number had gone below 50 . This one in 2016. So, that is what we are looking at, and unfortunately, in your state, you have got 12yearold machines that just are not working anymore, if you look back to those who were promoted, states do exactly what your state did, back in 2004, and in 2005, and understand who they were, and why they were doing it. That would go a long way in preventing this same thing from happening every 12 years, because we dont have hundreds of millions dollars to be spent every decade. On that subject, is there any objection to staff. We have had several comments on this issue of close elections and at least we are trying come pile some information. Any objection to staff trying obtain the information, either to the extent that it exists online, or if necessary to make requests the states . Any objection to that . Okay. Commissioner blackwell. Mr. Chairman. Commissioner gardner just under scored a point that i was making in my opening remarks and in the yale, policy review. Some of it is not within the per view of the commission, but you know, we, we know and we defend and we advance the right to vote, but we dont talk enough about the duty to vote. And if you take a look at what is happen engine the what is happening in the School System across the country, theres less and less and less attention being given to civics and citizenship and as a consequence, people are losing in a free society, the encouragement to exercise the duty to vote. And to deal with the any reasonable requirement to pak sure that he will willy cast votes are not diluted. Im the chairman of the International Foundation for electoral systems. We get most funding from the usaid, and other allied countries. And we conduct elections across, across the globe. Tenure is coming up in august. And liberia in october. We in fact strongly advocate voter i. D. , we were in the forefront advocating for the purple fingers. So, we find theres resistance, that thats a practical application. In to securing some way of making sure voters are who they say they are. And making sure that i. D. S are accessible. So, that is not burdensome and consistent with other things in our culture. Wli whether its taking out a library book or getting on an airplane. We are accustomed to having to show that we are who we pro port to be. We need to make sure to take on any reasonable burden of a protecting the integrity of the ballot box and thats one of the things that we can do as a commission. Is to under score the importance of the ballot. Yes . Yes, to respond. Since ive been in office, we have a great vendor. I think its a great product. We have gone from memory cards and now we go to thumb drives. But the reality is, elections are complex. And for anyone and everyone on the commission that has been involved in elections. After the elections, these are enormous jobs. And these are very complex. And we cant just turn our back on the fact that technology is here. Technology is coming. Technology will continue to rule our elections and for large metropolitan areas, and for you know, once you are new york city or detroit or minneapolis or birmingham. Whether or not ms. Mccormick passes all the rules that the Voting Machine Companies have to have standards where their Voting Machines will last for the next decade. Otherwise, we are going to be sitting here for a tuesday election and it will still be going on in to thursday. We have to have and whether its millions dollars or whatever, in my opinion, we still, we have to have this money. Counties and states have to have this money. Thats just a reality. Whether its a car, wlits a voting machine. Things are going to go wrong. You need money to fix them. And and we just cant turn our back and pretend that technology is not here, that we are not going to need a lot of money. States and counties and the years and decades to come. If i can make two suggestions to deal with collecting the data on what judge king and secretary gardner are expressing concern over, which i certainly share. One, it would behove the commission to ask what kind of confineme equipment the states are using and what the lifetime is of the equipment and how far along they are in it. That will give us an idea of what the needs of the states will be in that area. And second, i would recommend to the staff collect for the members of the commission, data from the u. S. U. S. Census bureau. The u. S. Census bureau does surveys after federal elections of individuals who did not vote and did not register to vote. And the surveys go into very extensive detail of trying to figure out why did they not register and why didnt they vote. That data is very, very useful for answering the questions that secretary gardener raised. Because the possible answers given are everything from problems registering to the biggest reason i think people give are they are just not interested in elections or interested in the candidates. But the point is i think we ougt to get the census surveys for the commissioners because i think it will provide you very Important Information on that particular issue. Thank you very much vice chair. Id like to add my voice to discussion around things like automatic Voter Registration. We discussed in maine. Im one of those, i reside in one of those civilized states that the secretary state has jurisdiction over the bureau of motor vehicles. And so we talk about things like voter id and automatic we talked about how to make that work. And ive had had some fascinating discussions with secretaries who are in charge of such systems. And the discussion about how it cleans up the voter rolls. And understanding the process that we go through and issuing a credential, which is not a light lift, depending on the individual citizen you are talking about. And as we, you know, fought the unsuccessful fight over the act, one of the things that we tried to raise with the department of Homeland Security was we can write any rule that we want. Its the exceptions that are going to keep us busy 18 hours a day. And we have dealt with individuals who were born on a farm, worked 0en that farm their whole life, did not have a birth certificate, did not have a Social Security number, then they had to go somewhere. And working that one backwards to try to make sure that they had the right documentation, to prove that they were an american citizen, to, you know, its hard to do without documentation. Those processes can be quite complex. However, once somebody completes it, under our databases, theyve shown they are legally present in the country or they are an american citizen, it makes the completion of a registration process relative childs play at that point. You know, and thats sort of also under scores the need for a better understanding of our cybersecurity needs. Weve already had a lengthy discussion here about financial needs for making the case. Whether we meant to or not. But i think what we out to be focused on longterm, what the goals of this group are going to be, i would hope that the goals would be answering some of these questions that have been raised here today. Affirmatively or negatively. And hoping to having fully vet that discussion, that the systems that we do have that work very well are those to be emulated. And where there are gaps we can address them in ways that again if there are opportunities, windows of opportunity for wrongdoing, you know, especially if theyve not been exploited, we should be table to say that as well. We had an investigation in the state of maine. There was an allegation that as many as 300 College Students matriculated at our wonderful state system of higher education, but who had come from other states in new england, lawless places like New Hampshire for example, registered in their home state but also registered to vote in maine, and what we discovered in that investigation in fact they had not voted in both states. And that answers a question. But i think the issue of registration in more than one state, you know, i happen to have handily enough a Voter Registration card from the state of maine. And part of what it concludes is have you been previously registered to no, county and state, and even a place for the phone number. Its incumbent on our voters to contact the district and say ive moved to maine, no longer in kansas. Whether or not that happens is arguable point. And citizen participation too is key here. We have a legal obligation for citizen of maine who hold driver license to update their physical address within 15 days of move. Nobody does it. I would hate to tell you that i didnt update my address for 15 years until i got called for jury duty and had to go to Hancock County courts and dont live there anymore. So those are some of the pitfalls that face us. And then determine whether or not the apparent risks i think it will help us inform the public. And i agree with secretary gardener about voter turnout. Im not sure turnout can be our goal. We dont oversee municipal elections but we do like to see the turnout. And we had a coastal town had almost 95 , way above any other municipality in the state. And we made a phone call what happened there. So they had a leashed dog ordinance, and they all went out and voted. So you never know whats going to drive people. Its not always the president ial election. Ill take one or two more comments and then try to summarize this topic. Go ahead. Just a couple of points on judge king regarding the rules. The election system does set guidelines, 48 of the 50 states use our guidelines some way or another. They are voluntary however. Just because they are voluntarily doesnt mean they have to vet them in other states they are selling their equipment. As far as databases, what kind of equipment is being used and where, i know we have some of that data. There are other groups collecting that data as well. So i think we can probably get that data from different sources already. And at least a good amount of it. I know its been kind of tough to follow up at least for the eac to actually get that information because we do use so many different types of voting equipment across the country. And not every state dictates what it uses that is county driven. The other thing i think we should look at is who is being disenfranchised with our country. We hear people being disenfranchised. I want as a point of order say i distributed copies of our most recent election Voting Survey to the commission. This is just an overview. The more detailed county by county is on the commissions website. But we did find out in this survey, for example, how many of our uniformed overseas citizens are voting or not, and there is disappointing numbers there. And i would like to look at who is actually being prevented from voting or not voting for whatever reason. Okay. Well, just to summarize. I didnt hear any objection to the five initial broad topics that i mentioned and many of you commented, adding to those topics. In addition, according to my notes, and im sure our designated federal officer has better notes, other topics cataloging how many elections have been decided close margins, double voting, causes for lack of participation t and perhaps seeking what data we might get from the census bureau, automatic Voter Registration, pros and cons, experience in c arkansas, and in maine legislative debate. Prosecution of election crimes. And implicit in all of these is funding and equipment to address all these issues. What databases are states using to verify the ac rcuracy of the rolls. Jury duty list question and any information that is in the government that cannot be to the states. Current convictions are they sharing that, where it may dis qualify from being a qualified voter in whatever state the conviction may occur. Dhs forms where the person indicates that as a non citizen they were registered to vote. And of course the larger question of dhs databases that were mentioned that states have had very limited or no access to to ensure that non citizens are on the rolls. And online registration. And non registration states like north dakota. So if there is no objection, we have really at least a dozen topics that perhaps we can ask staff to bunch together incoherent ways so each meeting can address related topics and hopefully we can start to dig much deeper into those related topics. The next topic on the agenda is future meetings. And i know in discussions with staff, the general idea has been that we should shoot for perhaps having four more Public Meetings with lots of staff working in between to collect information for us to assess. We may have more meetings than that if necessary. But i think four is at least a starting target. And of course there may it be additional topics that we choose to address. One of the things that was in that letter to the states was please answer some questions. And one of the questions was what topics would you like us to address . So we may get suggestions from the responding states indicating a strong desire to dive into one topic or another. So we shouldnt consider these topics exclusive list. These are simply the way we chart our course forward. And as the Commission Goes on we can amend topics we would like to address. So if we start with the idea that we want to attempt to have four more meetings in the next, well, i think we are talking in the next nine months or so, the initial question is how soon would our next meeting be . There has been a suggestion that we try to meet before october 1st. So middle of july right now. So we are talking about two and a half months, sometime in the next two and a half months to have that meeting. And next topic, ill throw this out to you, future meetings, where to have those meetings. In discussing with staff and looking at the experiences of past commissions, indeed i testified in front of the Obama Commission on Voter Registration. And i think that met in alaska if im not mistaken, somewhere on the west coast. Any rate it was a far flung place and im not suggesting that we go there. But i am suggesting that perhaps half of the future meetings be in places other than washington d. C. So welcoming suggestions as to where those places might be. Mr. Chairman. Yes. I wont go into where the places might be, but i would suggest two things. One, and hans under scored something for me, i had the pleasure of cochairing with former member of congress, and we were impressed with the data, the survey data that the census does collect on variety of subjects. And so i actually think that i would underscore, given that we are going to have sometime in between, because folks have other jobs that they attend to, that we get the document that hans under scored. The other thing, i had the pleasure of serving on the steno hana chair committee that pushed the machines out, the dollars out for the machines. It was a pretty extensive study. What they looked at is probably not changed. What has changed is the technology has rapidly changed. And probably a need for us, you know, there is a need for states to be competitive for new injection of cash to buy these machines or to update technology. But i would think that you can get ahold of that last hava study and get it to us. Its pretty interesting reading. There is some boring stuff in there. But there is some pretty interesting things we dont have to reinvent the wheel and we have a baseline we can start from. Given that, i think that this is an an Organization Orientation meeting. I know this is a little shorter. I would suggest that we either the third week or near the end of august or the second week past labor day of september be the next meeting. I dont care if its in washington or alaska again. But the reality is that i think that one of those weeks, the last week in august or the second week in september, would be a good jumping off point, given that we might have to reduce the time between meetings if in fact we are going to have an impact in early next year. Any other thoughts on scheduling . Bar harbor is always a good place to go to in september. I think the time line that you laid out mr. Vice chair is it a reasonable one. I would say one other thing that we talked about cybersecurity and getting information in terms of communication maybe we should include the congress in those communications. I know they are doing some investigation on some allegations about the involvement of the russian federation, some of our electoral systems, and maybe as they proceed with their investigations to keep us apprised of their findings would be very helpful to this commission. Does that sound reasonable, the suggestion of commissioner blackwell, that we maybe shoot for the end of august or first half of september as a meeting time . September would be better for me, just because our schedules fill up so quickly. Same for me. So first half, lets say that . Secretary gardener does that sound reasonable . As far as locations . Bar harbor is certainly one of my places. But are there any strong anyone on the commission have a preference . Obviously we will have more meetings in washington d. C. I anticipate that one thing we might want to consider doing is when the National Association of secretary of states has february meeting in dc that that might be ha convenient time to have a future meeting in d. C. But are there any places that are on your minds . I just suggest that we spread them out across the country geographically. So for in maine we go some police in the west, someplace in the south, someplace in the midwest. You know, i dont have a particular preference. But i think one of the easiest things we might be able to do is spread them out across the country is to pick the cities that are region al headquarters for the federal government. Atlanta is really the headquarters for the Southeast Region of the federal government. Thats where most of the federal agencies have officers. And thats where they are headquartered. The ease of that there are federal buildings we can use for the meeting. I dont know what the region al headquarters are for the northwest, but i would suggest we might want to use that. And i have a point mr. Mccormick says about spreading meetings around. One of the reasons is they welcome public input. That wouldnt be if we were on the west coast, if they wanted to provide it in person. So we dont need to resolve that right now, but it sounds like there is a consensus that we should try to have some geographic diversity to our meeting locations. Sounds like the first half of september is the consensus for date. Are there any other topics youd like to consider before we adjourn this first organizational meeting . All right. Do i hear a motion to adjourn . So moved. All in favor . Aye. We are adjourned. Heres a headline from usa today. Democrats, Civil Rights Group aim to block President Trump commission. Members of the dnc rights held a News Conference today in response to the first pc

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