News Clips

The FEC first launched its inquiry in 2018 after the nonprofit government watchdog group Common Cause filed a complaint against the Trump campaign. On Thursday, Paul S. Ryan, Common Cause’s vice president for policy and litigation, said the decision to drop the case showcased how the federal agency is “broken.” “The FEC’s nonpartisan career staff attorneys recommended that the Commission find reason to believe that Trump, his campaign committee, and the Trump Organization committed the violations alleged in Common Cause’s complaints,” Ryan said in a statement. “Today’s announcement that the FEC will not be holding Trump accountable for his campaign finance violations is just the latest display of dysfunction at the FEC.” Ryan also encouraged the Justice Department to pursue an investigation of Trump’s role in the scheme before the statute of limitations expires in October.

”Continued pursuit of the matter required at least four votes,” said Paul S. Ryan, vice president for policy and litigation at Common Cause, which filed one of the complaints against Trump and his campaign. “Republican Commissioners Cooksey and Trainor overrode the career attorneys and Democratic commissioners and killed the investigation.”

A separate federal suit filed in Tallahassee by the NAACP and Common Cause also says the law targets people who are Black, Latino or disabled. “For far too long, Florida’s lawmakers and elected officials have created a vast array of hurdles that have made it more difficult for these and other voters to make their voices heard,” these groups said.

"Florida's Republican legislative leaders seem determined to weaken the system that voters have relied on, without significant problems, for the better part of a generation," Sylvia Albert, voting and elections director for good-government watchdog Common Cause, said in a statement on April 28 after Florida's House passed the bill.

While sharing voter information may result in more updated voter lists, Georgia election officials shouldn't overly rely on the flood of data from ERIC to "weaponize" voter registrations cancellations, said Aunna Dennis, executive director for Common Cause Georgia, a government accountability organization. "I just hope our secretary of state uses it correctly and makes sure that voters have received information from notifications if they've moved," Dennis said. "It's a good system for checking registrations if the secretary of state's office uses it properly."

In Texas, the leaked video of the Harris County Republican Party’s training, which was published by the voting rights group Common Cause, recalled a similar episode from the 2010 midterm elections. That year, a Tea Party-affiliated group in Houston known as the King Street Patriots sent poll watchers to downtown polling locations. The flood of the mostly white observers into Black neighborhoods caused friction, and resurfaced not-too-distant memories when racial intimidation at the polls was commonplace in the South. The King Street Patriots would eventually evolve into True the Vote, one of the major national organizations now seeking more voting restrictions. Last year, True the Vote joined several lawsuits alleging fraud in the election (all failed) and led countrywide drives to try to recruit more poll watchers.