Trump voter commission releases voter complaints — and their personal data
(Image: file photo)
The Trump administration has published over a hundred emails submitted to the White House's election integrity commission -- and not everyone's happy.
The document, posted late Thursday in an unredacted form, is available directly from the White House's website.
It follows a request by the administration to submit comments from the public by email to the voter integrity commission, which was set up through an executive order signed by President Trump earlier this year. The commission is focused on investigating alleged reports of voter fraud and improper voting, despite a recent report that showed the average American "will be struck by lightning than that he will impersonate another voter at the polls."
Nearly all of the emails contained the senders' names. Many of the emails contained full names in the email headers, and in some cases, email addresses and home addresses, as well as phone numbers of senders who included the data, such as in their email signatures.
Several of the emails were extremely graphic in language.
"The most, um, the most transparent administration in history, I guess," joked privacy activist Parker Higgins in a tweet.
We got in contact with some of those whose information was released.
One person we spoke to, who did not want to be named (despite having their information posted), said they were surprised to hear that their information wasn't redacted.
Another person we spoke to confirmed they had sent an email, but they were not aware that their information would be made public. "These days your expectation of privacy are very minimal," said the person, who has also posted similar comments to other government websites, like the Federal Communications Commission. "The difference is, they tend to tell you when you post personal information," the person said.
The voter integrity pages on the White House does, however, say that the commission "may post such written comments publicly on our website, including names and contact information that are submitted."
The posting has drawn ire from some civil liberties groups.
"It's certainly worth noting that the commission was careful to redact the email address and phone number of its Designated Federal Officer but did not show the same concern for the contact information of public commenters," said Theresa Lee, staff attorney with the ACLU's Voting Rights Project, in an email.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment.
The commission has been dogged with controversy since it asked each and every state to submit voter data, including personal information like names and voting history, on millions of citizens. Several states refused to send the data, a move praised by privacy and civil liberties groups.
The commission later dropped the plan altogether.