All posts by Rick Hasen

“How Elon Musk Executed His Takeover of the Federal Bureaucracy”

February 28, 2025, 7:29 amchicaneryRick Hasen

NYT: On the last Friday of September 2023, Elon Musk dropped in about an hour late to a dinner party at the Silicon Valley mansion of the technology investor Chamath Palihapitiya. Mr. Musk’s visit was meant to be discreet.… Continue reading

“The case of the missing $3M: Eric Adams’ campaign finance woes grow”

February 27, 2025, 9:04 pmcampaign finance, chicaneryRick Hasen

Politico:A mysterious $3 million sitting in Mayor Eric Adams’ reelection account is the latest irregularity giving campaign finance officials cause to deny him crucial public matching funds. The Campaign Finance Board broadened the criteria it used to deny Adams… Continue reading

“As Facebook Abandons Fact-Checking, It’s Also Offering Bonuses for Viral Content”

February 27, 2025, 7:05 amcheap speechRick Hasen

ProPublica: Hours after Donald Trump was sworn in as president, users spread a false claim on Facebook that Immigration and Customs Enforcement was paying a bounty for reports of undocumented people. “BREAKING — ICE is allegedly offering $750 per illegal… Continue reading

“White House Correspondents’ Association cedes control of pool reports to Trump administration”

February 27, 2025, 7:00 amauthoritarian threats in USRick Hasen

Politico: Reversing decades of precedent, the White House Correspondents’ Association announced Wednesday that it would no longer coordinate shared coverage of President Donald Trump in an escalating dispute over press access to official events. The association, which represents more than… Continue reading

“How Wisconsin’s inconsistent voting instructions raise the risk of disenfranchisement”

February 27, 2025, 6:48 amabsentee ballots, election administrationRick Hasen

Votebeat: Whether a voter can accurately cast a ballot can come down to some very technical issues, and for that reason, we at Votebeat are used to going down some really narrow — but important — rabbit holes. For example,… Continue reading

“Kansas Senate Republicans take up plan to rewrite constitution to elect Supreme Court justices”

February 27, 2025, 6:43 amjudicial electionsRick Hasen

Kansas Reflector: Senate Republicans are pursuing a ballot question to make the Kansas Supreme Court an elected office, dismantling a decades-old merit-based nomination system for justices that voters put in place after a notorious scandal. The move is largely a… Continue reading

“Unduly Burdensome Public Records Requests and their Effects on Local Election Officials”

February 26, 2025, 1:11 pmchicanery, election administrationRick Hasen

New report from EVIC.

“Indiana Republicans Move to Ban Student IDs for Voting”

February 26, 2025, 1:09 pmvoter idRick Hasen

Bolts: Daniel Jenkins has volunteered to boost voter turnout on Indiana University’s Bloomington campus since becoming a student there in 2022. Jenkins, now a junior studying political science, has spent years helping other students fill out voter registration forms and… Continue reading

“In Crucial Judicial Race in Wisconsin, G.O.P. Now Has a Financial Edge”

February 26, 2025, 7:46 amcampaign finance, judicial electionsRick Hasen

NYT: The last time Wisconsin held an election for the state’s Supreme Court, Republicans cried foul over the wave of money from out-of-state Democrats that overwhelmed their candidate. Two years later, Republicans have learned their lesson. It is Democrats who… Continue reading

“Universal vote by mail is popular in Utah. GOP lawmakers continue to move away from it in a revised bill.”

February 26, 2025, 7:37 amabsentee ballotsRick Hasen

The Salt Lake Tribune reports.

“State Election Officials Seek to Avert Deeper Cuts”

February 25, 2025, 6:57 amchicanery, election administrationRick Hasen

NYT: Alarmed by cuts already made to federal agencies that help safeguard elections, and fearful that more could be coming, a bipartisan group of the nation’s top state election officials has appealed to Kristi Noem, the secretary of homeland security,… Continue reading

“Before Ascending to Top Tier of F.B.I., Bongino Fueled Right-Wing Disbelief”

February 25, 2025, 6:51 amchicaneryRick Hasen

NYT: On a recent episode of his wildly popular podcast, the right-wing provocateur Dan Bongino asserted that he would soon be able to show that pipe bombs found near the Capitol the day of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack were… Continue reading

Connecticut: “Arrest warrants detail charges of voter fraud in Bridgeport”

February 25, 2025, 6:49 amabsentee ballots, chicaneryRick Hasen

CT Mirror: State prosecutors took a big step Friday when they charged five Bridgeport Democrats with more than 150 election-related crimes, but arrest warrants suggest the sprawling investigation into voter fraud and ballot harvesting might not end there. The charges,… Continue reading

Department of Insanity (and Inanity): “Warner, Who Said CIA Stole Election, Now Leads DOJ Civil Rights”

February 24, 2025, 9:53 amchicanery, Department of Justice, fraudulent fraud squadRick Hasen

Bloomberg Law: The Justice Department has inserted Mac Warner, who last year espoused false claims that the CIA stole Trump’s 2020 presidential victory with the FBI’s help, to run the civil rights division, replacing an ousted career official who’s started… Continue reading