[EL] ELB News and Commentary 9/21/18

[Rick Hasen]

Today’s Must-Read: “Russia’s Pro-Gun Influence Accounts Copied The NRA — And Sometimes, Vice Versa”<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101249>
Posted on September 21, 2018 9:28 am<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101249> by Rick Hasen<https://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Tim Mak<https://www.npr.org/2018/09/21/649209429/russias-pro-gun-influence-accounts-copied-the-nra-and-sometimes-vice-versa> for NPR with a fascinating report:

Russian social media agitators who pushed pro-gun messages in the United States sometimes copied the language of the National Rifle Association. And sometimes, the NRA copied them.

What isn’t clear is whether there was any relationship between the social media users or whether the duplication was done without the other’s awareness, part of the broader tide of advocacy about gun rights.

The NRA did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

What is clear is that, at times, the Russians followed so closely behind the American gun rights group that it duplicated its content word for word.

The Internet Research Agency pushed pro-gun messages using an account called Defend.The.Second on Instagram. Facebook, which owns Instagram, confirmed to NPR that the account was connected to the troll farm.

In one instance, the Internet Research Agency<https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/400/1*SLoU9qYg6zqawQV5R5bGPA.png> copied the description of Democratic National Committee deputy chairman Keith Ellison, originally made by the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action<https://www.nraila.org/articles/20161201/dnc-chair-frontrunner-rep-keith-ellison-d-minn-is-an-anti-second-amendment-radical>.


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Posted in campaigns<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=59>, chicanery<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=12>


“Hacks, Security Gaps And Oligarchs: The Business Of Voting Comes Under Scrutiny”<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101247>
Posted on September 21, 2018 9:24 am<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101247> by Rick Hasen<https://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

NPR:<https://www.npr.org/2018/09/21/649535367/hacks-security-gaps-and-oligarchs-the-business-of-voting-comes-under-scrutiny>

It’s been a tough couple of years for the business of voting.

There’s the state that discovered a Russian oligarch now finances the company that hosts its voting data.

Then there’s the company that manufactures and services voter registration software in eight states that found itself hacked by Russian operatives leading up to the 2016 presidential election.

And then there’s the largest voting machine company in the country, which initially denied and then admitted it had installed software on its systems considered by experts to be extremely vulnerable to hacking.

Private companies play a crucial role in elections, from printing and designing ballots, to manufacturing voting machines, to hosting results websites. The industry exists because the local and state governments who run elections don’t have the resources or expertise to maintain all aspects of an election themselves.

As the United States grapples with how to make its elections more secure, the voting industry’s security practices are under scrutiny like never before.
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Posted in election administration<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>, election law biz<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=51>


“Constituent called 911, suspecting drug deal, on Dane County Supervisor Shelia Stubbs while she canvassed for Assembly seat”<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101245>
Posted on September 21, 2018 9:11 am<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101245> by Rick Hasen<https://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Cap Times:<https://madison.com/ct/news/local/govt-and-politics/election-matters/constituent-called-suspecting-drug-deal-on-dane-county-supervisor-shelia/article_65a7dcea-52e0-5ad0-acea-135d10c3def0.html#tracking-source=home-top-story>

Stubbs will be the first African-American person elected to represent Dane County in the state Legislature, in a state that continues to rank among the worst in the nation for racial equality<https://www.wpr.org/wisconsin-considered-one-worst-states-racial-disparities>. She was, at the time of the campaign, the Dane County Board’s only African-American supervisor.

Stubbs is a former parole agent and educator. She campaigned on criminal justice reform, diverting funding for prisons to education, implementing universal background checks for gun purchases, protecting abortion access, providing universal access to health care, supporting workers’ rights, strengthening the social safety net and bolstering environmental protections.

She’s far from the first African-American person to find herself interacting with police after engaging in a normal activity. She’s not even the first elected official to have it happen this year. Oregon state Rep. Janelle Bynum said she was approached by a sheriff’s deputy while canvassing in July<https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/05/us/janelle-bynum-police-portland.html>, after a constituent called police concerned that she was planning to rob homes because she was taking notes on her cell phone between houses.
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Posted in Uncategorized<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=1>


Ed Whelan’s Spectacular Fail<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101243>
Posted on September 21, 2018 9:04 am<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101243> by Rick Hasen<https://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Last night, in a remarkable act of bad faith, Ed Whelan accused another person without credible evidence of the attempted rape of Dr. Ford, in an effort to claim that Judge Kavanaugh was a victim of mistaken identity. The extensive claim on Twitter, since deleted, was completely unsupported, and named as the perpetrator former classmate of Kavanaugh’s who is now a middle school teacher. It was an attempt to use Zillow and Reddit-type conspiracy theories to connect the dots in a desperate effort to save the Kavanaugh nomination by having Senate Republicans attack Ford not for lying but for being “mistaken.” He did not check with Dr. Ford, who has since stated<https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/christine-blasey-fords-high-school-classmate-controversy-felt/story?id=57935927> she knew the other person well and there is no way she would have confused this other person with Kavanaugh. Nor did he follow basic journalistic ethics and give this other person a chance to respond to these charges. (Although Whelan posted on Twitter, he regularly writes for National Review online).

Whether or not the named person can sue Whelan for defamation (something I think is quite plausible), it was based on no evidence and showed a kind of desperation to save this nomination as the right gets tantalizingly close to a five-Justice majority to overturn Roe v. Wade and to reverse advances in gay rights, voting rights, and many other areas. It seems clear that Whelan had help<https://twitter.com/maggieNYT/status/1043145499912691712> with this mendacious attack, and the question is whether it was coordinated with Senate Judiciary Committee staffers, Kavanaugh, the White House, or others. (Josh Marshall lays out the evidence of possible coordination<https://talkingpointsmemo.com/prime-beta/my-take-on-where-we-are-with-kavanaugh-5-a-very-bad-night-for-kavanaugh>).

But Whelan’s trial balloon<https://twitter.com/jrubinblogger/status/1042911334483062784?s=21> landed like a thud<https://twitter.com/stevenmazie/status/1043001628763148289>. People on the Kavanaugh side denied knowledge of this in advance and Whelan himself (perhaps under pressure from his funders or seeing that his attempt to save Kavanaugh only created more reasons for an independent investigation about the facts of the case rather than a rushed confirmation vote for Kavanaugh) deleted the series of tweets.

This morning Whelan issued an apology<https://twitter.com/EdWhelanEPPC/status/1043117304152817664?s=19>. But he apologized only for naming the individual, and not for raising a false claim based on no credible evidence in order to undermine the testimony of Dr. Ford for purely political reasons. Some news outlets have missed<https://twitter.com/rickhasen/status/1043157305850658817> this point<https://twitter.com/rickhasen/status/1043160812779495424>, simply characterizing Whelan as “apologizing” for a series of tweets. He’s still making the same claim about Dr. Ford and this other person, just without the name. As Steve Vladeck<https://twitter.com/steve_vladeck/status/1043159627997892609> writes: “The Whelan thread makes no sense _except_ insofar as it both suggests mistaken identity _and_ attempts to identify a superficially plausible doppelgänger. As such, the ‘apology’ is utterly disingenuous, because he’s not disavowing the entire misbegotten thread.”

As readers of this blog know,<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=98592> Whelan consistently operates in bad faith. People should keep this in mind when considering including Ed in symposia and events where people with diverse views come together for reasoned discussion. He showed spectacularly bad judgment for a guy who is very smart but who seems to have lost his moral compass.

(More from me in this tweetstorm<https://twitter.com/rickhasen/status/1042901616901283840>.)


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Posted in Uncategorized<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=1>


“Voting at Home Will Help Save Our Democracy”<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101241>
Posted on September 20, 2018 4:31 pm<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101241> by Rick Hasen<https://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Phil Keisling and Sam Reed NYT oped<https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/19/opinion/voting-at-home-will-help-save-our-democracy.html>.
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Posted in absentee ballots<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=53>


“Shareholders Push Nike for Greater Disclosure on Political Spending”<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101239>
Posted on September 20, 2018 10:02 am<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101239> by Rick Hasen<https://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

WSJ:<https://blogs.wsj.com/riskandcompliance/2018/09/20/shareholders-push-nike-for-greater-disclosure-on-political-spending/?mod=djemRiskCompliance>

Investors are seeking greater transparency from Nike related to its political spending and putting a proposal demanding regular reporting on political contributions to a vote on Thursday.

The vote, at the company’s annual general meeting in Beaverton, Ore., comes a few weeks after the sportswear giant unveiled an advertising campaign featuring NFL quarterback-turned-activist Colin Kaepernick. The campaign led some consumers<https://www.wsj.com/articles/nikeboycott-is-over-why-retail-activism-rarely-changes-sales-1537099200> to call for a boycott of the company and others to buy more of its sneakers.
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Posted in campaign finance<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=10>


CEIR Releases 2018 Voter Registration Database Security Report<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101237>
Posted on September 20, 2018 9:58 am<https://electionlawblog.org/?p=101237> by Rick Hasen<https://electionlawblog.org/?author=3>

Read it here<https://electioninnovation.org/2018-vrdb-security/>.
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Posted in election administration<https://electionlawblog.org/?cat=18>


--
Rick Hasen
Chancellor's Professor of Law and Political Science
UC Irvine School of Law
401 E. Peltason Dr., Suite 1000
Irvine, CA 92697-8000
949.824.3072 - office
rhasen at law.uci.edu<mailto:rhasen at law.uci.edu>
http://www.law.uci.edu/faculty/full-time/hasen/
http://electionlawblog.org<http://electionlawblog.org/>
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