Election deniers take aim at group that helps states maintain voter rolls

[RandySF]

At a time of hyperpolarization over voting and elections, Democrats and Republicans had largely managed to agree on one thing — that a little-known data-sharing consortium of more than 30 states has helped keep voter rolls updated and free of opportunities for fraud.

But the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), as the consortium is known, has been straining lately under the weight of accusations and misinformation from election deniers. Critics, some of whom have aligned themselves with the false stolen-election narrative of former president Donald Trump, have claimed that the group is actually a left-wing vehicle that shares sensitive voter data with liberal groups, encourages bloated and inaccurate rolls and enables the very fraud it is intended to stamp out. ERIC’s leaders deny these accusations.

Now, ERIC’s survival is in jeopardy, with Republican-led states withdrawing, others threatening to do so and heated disputes breaking out among members over how to save the organization. Should ERIC collapse, its boosters say the country would lose one of its most powerful tools for keeping ballot fraud at bay just as states are beginning to prepare for the 2024 election calendar.

“Why would people who purport to want more election integrity seek to damage the best tool out there?” asked David Becker, who helped found ERIC in 2012 with seven states when he led the elections program at the Pew Charitable Trusts and watched it grow over the ensuing decade. “The only thing I can come up with is they don’t actually want election integrity. They want more chaos.”




https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/03/06/election-deniers-voter-rolls/

[Mister Ed]

1. "Why would people who purport to want more election integrity seek to damage the best tool" for it?

“The only thing I can come up with is they don’t actually want election integrity. They want more chaos.”