Voting Rights

The 11th Circuit’s remand of Georgia’s voter roll purges is a victory for Georgia and for democracy. Common Cause Georgia is encouraged with the news of our voter roll purge case against Secretary of State Brian Kemp. Our state should not be using random criteria to remove legally registered voters from the voter rolls.

There’s some encouraging news from several states this morning about voting rights and voting security.

Common Cause Pennsylvania announced that after further analysis they have found no violations of the Voting Rights Act in the new congressional map issued by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Feb. 19.

The American public must have confidence in the leadership of Census Bureau to ensure everyone is counted accurately. Public outrage met reports that Thomas Brunell would be named deputy director, a slot that does not require Senate confirmation, but that he would in fact lead the Census. The controversy was well founded. Brunell’s controversial background as an academic who regular testified in support Republican gerrymanders would have politicized the national headcount.

Washington is focused on the Nunes memo today, but there’s plenty of other things going on.

As President Trump prepares to deliver his first State of the Union later this week, Common Cause and Democracy 21 are releasing a new report, “The Art of the Lie,” which pulls together a dizzying series of events and provides an overview of this unprecedented presidency. The report bundles together the crises, conflicts of interest, and new lows of the last year in 20 distinct issue areas to capture Trump’s failed first year record on matters of government integrity and accountability.