{"id":532,"date":"2017-06-30T15:16:41","date_gmt":"2017-06-30T19:16:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gopplaybook.com\/?p=532"},"modified":"2018-03-08T15:21:27","modified_gmt":"2018-03-08T20:21:27","slug":"kris-kobach-says-he-cant-comply-with-kris-kobachs-voter-data-request","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.gopplaybook.com\/?p=532","title":{"rendered":"Kris Kobach says he can\u2019t comply with Kris Kobach\u2019s voter data request"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By\u00a0<\/span>Christopher Ingraham<\/a>\u00a0<\/span>June 30, 2017<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>Email the author<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n
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Donald Trump greeted\u00a0 Kansas Secretary of State, Kris Kobach at Trump’s golf club in Bedminster Township, N.J., in November. (Photo by Jabin Botsford\/The Washington Post)<\/span><\/div>\n

Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach co-chairs President Trump’s voter fraud commission, which is tasked with finding evidence to support the president’s unsubstantiated claim\u00a0that there was widespread voter fraud in the 2016 election.<\/p>\n

Kobach\u00a0recently sent letters to all 50 states<\/a>\u00a0asking them to provide the commission with their entire voter files. The request\u00a0specifically spelled out<\/a>\u00a0sensitive pieces of information the commission wants to obtain, including voters names, party affiliations, military status and the last four digits of voters’ Social Security numbers.<\/p>\n

As secretary of state, Kobach is tasked with supplying Kansas’s data to the Trump\u00a0commission. There’s just one problem: He won’t be able to fully comply with his own request.<\/p>\n

Kobach\u00a0told the Kansas City Star\u00a0<\/a>on Friday that\u00a0he would not be providing any parts of Kansas voters’ Social Security numbers because\u00a0that data is not publicly available under state law.\u00a0“In Kansas, the Social Security number is not publicly available,” he said. “Every state receives the same letter, but we\u2019re not asking for it if it\u2019s not publicly available.”<\/p>\n

Many states have balked<\/a>\u00a0at all of part of the commission’s request, citing legal and privacy concerns or an unwillingness to cooperate with a commission that\u00a0elections experts worry is laying the groundwork<\/a>\u00a0for voter roll purges.<\/p>\n

Another\u00a0secretary of state who’s a member of the Trump commission also said Friday that she is unable to comply with the request. Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson\u00a0said in a statement<\/a>that \u201cIndiana law doesn’t permit the Secretary of State to provide the personal information requested by Secretary Kobach.\u201d\u00a0The only publicly available data, she said, were voters’ names and their congressional district assignments.<\/p>\n

[How Trump\u2019s nationwide voter data request could lead to voter suppression<\/a>]<\/i><\/p>\n

Elections experts have said<\/a>\u00a0that the scope and details of the request suggest that the commission hasn’t fully thought through the implications of what they’re asking. For instance, while voter rolls are technically public data, many\u00a0states\u00a0have privacy laws preventing the disclosure of things like Social Security numbers and military status.<\/p>\n

Kobach’s\u00a0letter also invited states to send the data\u00a0by email,\u00a0which is highly insecure<\/a>.\u00a0The federal privacy act\u00a0may prevent the federal government<\/a>\u00a0from collecting information on voters’ party affiliation, which the commission requested. And the two-week time frame the letter lays out for compiling the database strikes many experts as unrealistic.<\/p>\n

Kobach\u00a0sent the letter to all 50 secretaries of state<\/a>, even though\u00a0some of those secretaries of state are not the stewards of state voter information.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat a blunder,\u201d political scientist and elections expert Rick Hasen\u00a0said on Twitter<\/a>. \u201cKobach can’t provide the information he himself requested in the letter. Oh my oh my.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kobach\u00a0told the Kansas City Star<\/a>\u00a0that while his commission does not have the authority to compel states to hand over the data, he believes the U.S. Justice Department does have that power.\u00a0He said he couldn’t say whether the Justice Department would be involved in the commission’s data request at a later date.<\/p>\n