Video Links and Quotes from Today’s Media Briefing #3: Election Day 2022 with Common Cause

Washington, DC—This evening, a panel of Common Cause’s national policy experts and state leaders briefed the media on the state of voting nationally and in California, Georgia, New Mexico, and Pennsylvania. 

If you missed today’s media briefing, you can view the recording here.  

Our next briefing is tomorrow, Wednesday, Nov. 9 at 11am ET. To register, click here. 

Select quotes from the briefing, in order of speakers, are below. 

Regarding a mostly safe and smooth Election Day nationally:
“I am happy to report that today has been relatively quiet on the political violence front. We were absolutely prepared for more significant incidents, but they have not come to fruition. There are two trends that I have really seen throughout the day. The first is that there have been reports in a number of states of folks who are monitoring polling locations with cameras, livestreaming voters as they come in. The second trend is aggressive electioneering. In most of these situations, if not all of them, the situations have been resolved super cleanly,” said Suzanne Almeida, director of state operations at Common Cause.

Regarding strong voter turnout in New Mexico:
“New Mexico voters are always eager to vote and participate in our democracy, and this year’s midterm election is no different. We’ve seen outstanding voter turnout, with over 14 thousand New Mexicans registering to vote today, and nearly 500 thousand who have already voted early or by absentee ballot,” said Mario Jimenez, executive director of Common Cause New Mexico.

Regarding a mostly quiet Election Day in Pennsylvania:
“Here in the Keystone state, we value our freedom to vote. Voters understand that voting rights are the gateway to every other right and we take our responsibility on Election Day seriously. As of 4 p.m. today, we have fielded more than 500 calls from voters asking how to make sure they get a say in this election, questions mostly about polling locations, voter registration confirmation, and about vote by mail. We intend to end this day as we started—with safe and smooth voting experiences for all,” said Khalif Ali, executive director of Common Cause Pennsylvania.

Regarding strong voter turnout in Georgia:
“Despite people not receiving their absentee ballots, despite the redistricting of precincts, people are still coming out to vote. We are projecting that over 2 million folks will come in person to vote today at our polls,” said Aunna Dennis, executive director of Common Cause Georgia.

Regarding Southern California’s election protection program:
“Just this weekend, we strategized with election officials and partners to help ensure a voter with a disability who did not receive their mail-in ballot was able to vote. The Los Angeles County office ended up driving a replacement ballot directly to the voter’s home and canceled their previously issued ballot so they could vote. This is an example of how a proactive elections office should run, working in collaboration with election protection partners to ensure all Californians are able to vote without barriers,” said Jonathan Mehta Stein, executive director of California Common Cause.

Regarding social media platforms allowing disinformation to spread online:
“Despite the fact that this is the first major election since the 2020 election, which really saw a dramatic increase and a recognition by the social media platforms of the danger of election disinformation, we are not seeing a significant improvement on behalf of the social media companies. That is not just Twitter, but also Meta” said Jesse Littlewood, vice president of campaigns at Common Cause.

Regarding misinformation spreading on Twitter:
“We flagged maybe a dozen high profile tweets, maybe more today, from people with vast platforms who were either circulating video that contained harassment of poll workers, contained viral disinformation, or that contained content that was otherwise violative of the civic integrative policy,” said Emma Steiner, disinformation analyst at Common Cause. 

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