Voting Rights

Common Cause president Karen Hobert Flynn explained that "we are a democracy and democracies count all the votes. But the president is freely using his Twitter account in an attempt to deliberately undermine the nation's vote count and undercut Americans' faith in our elections." "We are urging Twitter to take immediate action to enforce its own policies and curb President Trump's Twitter campaign to spread disinformation and sow unrest amongst his followers," she added. "The president's actions are dangerous and irresponsible and Twitter has an obligation to be a responsible corporate citizen and safeguard our democracy."

Leaders of two nonpartisan organizations sent Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey a letter urging him to take further action to stop Mr. Trump from posting more on his platform about the presidential race. The plea from the presidents of Common Cause and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law followed Democratic congressmen similarly calling a day earlier for Twitter to suspend Mr. Trump.  Mr. Trump has repeatedly violated Twitter‘s policies recently, they noted, evidenced by the company acting on several of his posts on the social media service after Election Day ended Tuesday. They argued that simply applying warning labels or limiting the spread of Mr. Trump‘s recent posts has proven to be “insufficient,” however, and encouraged Twitter to intervene further. “We fear that, in the absence of action by Twitter, the President may be successful in his goal of delegitimizing the integrity of our democratic processes for many, and not just Twitter users but other voters and members of the public, sowing uncertainty about the voting and elections process and potentially inciting violence against civil servants or others,” they warned in the letter.

“There are specific rules in Pennsylvania about where poll watchers can stand and what they can do,” said Suzanne Almeida, interim director of Common Cause Pennsylvania. “It applies to both parties equally. Everyone has the exact same access. This is not about disadvantaging one party over another.”

Today, Common Cause and the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, called on Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to suspend the Twitter account of President Donald Trump for his repeated violations of Twitter’s Civic Integrity Policy by spreading disinformation about the 2020 Election to millions of Twitter users online. The letter points to President Trump’s repeated attempts to disrupt the proper counting of ballots, undermine the democratic process, and stir unrest through his tweets.

There were several voting issues reported to nonpartisan voting rights groups in Pennsylvania but people turned out and were able to cast their ballot, despite "significant obstacles" to do so, according to Suzanne Almeida, interim executive director for Common Cause Pennsylvania.  "An election is successful when every single eligible voter is able to cast their ballot and have equal access to a positive experience at the polling place. We did not see that yesterday, so that being said, we also did not see a disaster," Almeida said at a Pennsylvania Election Protection Coalition news briefing.

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.