Abuse of Power

In our democracy every vote counts and every vote must be counted. The will of the people is reflected in how we cast our ballots. Politicians do not get to decide whose votes will count and whose votes won’t count. We choose our politicians, they do not choose us.

"This is an hour by hour, maybe minute by minute situation in Pennsylvania," said Suzanne Almeida, interim executive director of Common Cause Pennsylvania. “We will be prepared, however, to do whatever we need to to make sure every eligible vote gets counted.”

“Make sure, regardless what happens with litigation, that your vote is counted,” said Sylvia Albert, director of voting and elections for Common Cause, which called for Barrett to recuse herself from any potential election litigation. “To me, it seems a clear voter-suppression tactic and an effort to invalidate ballots” that a party does not think are for them. “I would hope the court would see that as an obvious power grab, but the reality is, we don’t know what the court would do,” Albert said.

Jesse Littlewood, vice president for campaigns at Common Cause, called the effort by the secretaries of state a “remarkable” attempt to “strong-arm Facebook.” “It’s troubling to see those overseeing elections try to stop what appears to be a successful project to register voters,” he said.

"There is no telling how many that could be but it may be tens of thousands of ballots will come in late and not be counted even if they were mailed and postmarked before or on Nov. 3," Jay Heck, the Wisconsin executive director of Common Cause, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to protecting and improving voters' rights and access to the ballot, told ABC News.

“This looks like the latest example of Trump administration officials bending and breaking ethics laws and norms,” said Paul Seamus Ryan, the vice president of litigation for the group Common Cause. “This is unfortunately par for the course for this administration.”