Category Archives: chicanery

Yale “MFIA Clinic Report Provides Roadmap for Attorneys to Challenge Election Disinformation”

cheap speech, chicanery

Important report released by Yale Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic:

Students from Yale Law School’s Media Freedom and Information Access (MFIA) Clinic have released a new white paper titled “Using the Ku Klux Klan Act to Combat Election Disinformation: A Guide for Practitioners.”

The guide offers a roadmap for attorneys seeking civil remedies against certain forms of digital election disinformation, such as lies about how to vote, impersonation of candidates or officials, and misinformation intended to intimidate voters.

Read the white paper: Using the Ku Klux Klan Act to Combat Election Disinformation: A Guide for Practitioners 

The report focuses on two underutilized provisions of the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871: the “Support-or-Advocacy” clauses of 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3) and the companion “Neglect-to-Prevent” provision of 42 U.S.C. § 1986. Though originally passed to combat Reconstruction-era voter intimidation by the Ku Klux Klan, these statutes remain powerful tools for modern election protection, according to the clinic. The white paper argues that § 1985(3) can provide a private cause of action when election-related disinformation arises from a conspiracy and amounts to a common-law tort (such as intentional interference with the right to vote, misappropriation of likeness, or false-light invasion of privacy) carried out “on account of” someone’s support for a federal candidate.

Additionally, § 1986 may create liability for third parties like robocall vendors, group leaders, or public officials who knowingly fail to prevent such conspiracies when they have the power to do so.

While the First Amendment rightly shields much false speech about elections, the report outlines scenarios where challenges to election disinformation may prevail despite the First Amendment, such as when the disinformation at issue constitutes a lie about election mechanics or an impersonation of a candidate, or when it is particularly likely to undermine election integrity. Drawing on legal precedent, historical context, and real-world examples — including social media ads that promote “texting to vote” and robocalls that impersonate candidates — the report offers a path forward for legal practitioners aiming to challenge harmful election lies without infringing on protected speech….

(Disclosure: I gave feedback on an earlier version of this report as well as worked with the clinic and Protect Democracy on the amicus brief filed in the Mackey case.)

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“The Mothership Vortex: An Investigation Into the Firm at the Heart of the Democratic Spam Machine; How a single consulting firm extracted $282 million from a network of spam PACs while delivering just $11 million to actual campaigns.”

campaign finance, campaigns, chicanery

Must-read from Adam Bonica:

The digital deluge is a familiar annoyance for anyone on a Democratic fundraising list. It’s a relentless cacophony of bizarre texts and emails, each one more urgent than the last, promising that your immediate $15 donation is the only thing standing between democracy and the abyss.

The main rationale offered for this fundraising frenzy is that it’s a necessary evil—that the tactics, while unpleasant, are brutally effective at raising the money needed to win. But an analysis of the official FEC filings tells a very different story. The fundraising model is not a brutally effective tool for the party; it is a financial vortex that consumes the vast majority of every dollar it raises.

We all have that one obscure skill we’ve inadvertently maxed out. Mine happens to be navigating the labyrinth of campaign finance data. So, after documenting the spam tactics in a previous article, I told myself I’d just take a quick look to see who was behind them and where the money was going.

That “quick look” immediately pulled me in. The illusion of a sprawling grassroots movement, with its dozens of different PAC names, quickly gave way to a much simpler and more alarming reality. It only required pulling on a single thread—tracing who a few of the most aggressive PACs were paying—to watch their entire manufactured world unravel. What emerged was not a diverse network of activists, but a concentrated ecosystem built to serve the firm at its center: Mothership Strategies.…

The core defense of these aggressive fundraising tactics rests on a single claim: they are brutally effective. The FEC data proves this is a fallacy. An examination of the money flowing through the Mothership network reveals a system designed not for political impact, but for enriching the consultants who operate it.

To understand the scale of this operation, consider the total amount raised. Since 2018, this core network of Mothership-linked PACs has raised approximately $678 million from individual donors. (This number excludes money raised by the firm’s other clients, like candidate campaigns, focusing specifically on the interconnected PACs at the heart of this system.) Of that total fundraising haul, $159 million was paid directly to Mothership Strategies for consulting fees, accounting for the majority of the $282 million Mothership has been paid by all its clients combined.

But the firm’s direct cut is only part of the story. The “churn and burn” fundraising model is immensely expensive to operate. Sending millions of texts and emails requires massive spending on digital infrastructure. For instance, FEC filings show this network paid $22.5 million to a single vendor, Message Digital LLC, a firm that specializes in text message delivery.

The remaining hundreds of millions disappeared into a maze of self-reported categories: $150 million to consulting/fundraising, $70 million to salaries and payroll. There are some disbursements to what seem to be legitimate advocacy and organizing–for instance Progressive Turnout Project reports paying Shawmut Services $19 million for canvassing. However, most of the unclassifiable expenditures appear to be administrative costs or media buys that feed back into the fundraising machine itself.

After subtracting these massive operational costs—the payments to Mothership, the fees for texting services, the cost of digital ads and list rentals—the final sum delivered to candidates and committees is vanishingly small. My analysis of the network’s FEC disbursements reveals that, at most, $11 million of the $678 million raised from individuals has made its way to candidates, campaigns, or the national party committees.

But here’s the number that should end all debate:

This represents a fundraising efficiency rate of just 1.6 percent.

Here’s what that number means: for every dollar a grandmother in Iowa donates believing she’s saving democracy, 98 cents goes to consultants and operational costs. Just pennies reach actual campaigns….

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“Former Trump prosecutor Jack Smith faces investigation by Office of Special Counsel”

authoritarian threats in US, chicanery, Department of Justice

WaPo:

The U.S. Office of special counsel said Saturday it is investigating Jack Smith, the former Justice Department official who oversaw two federal prosecutions of Donald Trump, for potentially violating the law barring federal officials from political activity.

The independent agencytasked with overseeing investigations into partisan influence and coercion confirmed its investigation of Smith over potential Hatch Act violations.

The Hatch Act prohibits most federal employees from using their official authority to influence elections or engage in overt political activity on the job. If the office concludes a federal employee has violated the law, it refers the case to the president. Discipline can range from a reprimand to a removal from federal service. Criminal penalties are rare.

Smith, who resigned from the Justice Department in the days before Trump’s inauguration this year, became the public face of the department’s efforts to hold Trump accountable for two sets of alleged crimes. Trump was accused of trying to block Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory, and, after leaving the White House upon completion of his first term, mishandling highly classified documents and obstructing government efforts to retrieve them. Neither case went to trial.

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“Democratic governors advise strong counteroffensive on redistricting”

chicanery, redistricting

Politico:

A  group of Democratic governors is urging its colleagues to get tough in countering Republican-backed efforts to gerrymander Texas’ congressional districts.

“It’s incumbent upon Democrat governors, if they have the opportunity, to respond in kind,” outgoing Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly told reporters at a Democratic Governors Association meeting Friday. “I’m not a big believer in unilateral disarmament.”

The advice from Kelly, who chairs the DGA, came two days after Texas Republicans proposed congressional lines that would create five GOP-friendly House districts ahead of next year’s midterms. Democrats need only to net three seats to regain control of the lower chamber.

Kelly didn’t cite California Gov. Gavin Newsom by name, but he is the most high profile, and likeliest, example of a Democrat considering a counteroffensive remapping effort to squeeze more seats from a blue state. On Thursday, Newsom said he’d seek a November special election to have voters approve a new House map that would boost Democrats’ numbers. It’s an expensive and potentially perilous gamble that his Democratic colleagues throughout the country appear to be backing — a notably more aggressive posture for the party….

NYT on “maximum warfare”:

The aggressive push by President Trump and Republicans in Texas to squeeze as many as five House Democrats out of office before a single vote is cast in the 2026 midterm elections has opened up a new chapter in an era of unconstrained partisan warfare.

For six months, Democrats have watched, sometimes haplessly and sometimes hopelessly, as Mr. Trump and his allies have bent much of the country’s political, legal and educational systems to his will.

But the bald attempt to redraw the Texas congressional map to shore up House Republicans has pushed many Democrats, including some longtime institutionalists, to a breaking point. Now, they are vowing to “fight fire with fire” and even to embrace some of the very gerrymandering tactics they have long decried as anti-democratic.

“The Texas Republicans are taking us on a race to the bottom,” said Representative Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat who lamented in an interview that his party must reluctantly participate in “this rotten system.”…

The gerrymandering is deeply consequential at a time when a single House race can cost tens of millions of dollars. Republicans won control of the House in 2024 by only three seats, a margin the remapping in Texas alone would more than double.

One person close to the president, who insisted on anonymity to describe the White House’s political strategy candidly, summed it up succinctly: “Maximum warfare, everywhere, all the time.”

The redistricting push is only one element. Mr. Trump has targeted Democratic law firms with executive actions. He has threatened prosecutions of and ordered investigations into his political enemies, while the Justice Department has dropped lawsuits aimed at protecting voting rights. And his congressional allies are investigating ActBlue, the organization that processes an overwhelming share of online donations for Democrats….

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“Forged signatures found on Mayor Adams’ petitions to run as an independent”

ballot access, chicanery

Gothamist:

Mayor Eric Adams’ re-election campaign submitted faked and fraudulently obtained petition signatures in his effort to secure a spot on the November ballot as an independent candidate, a Gothamist investigation has found.

Gothamist reviewed signatures submitted from across New York City and found people who said their names were forged, as well as people who said they were deceived into signing the petitions. In at least three instances, the campaign turned in signatures from dead people.

Under state law, Adams needed to submit at least 7,500 signatures from voters who wanted him on the general election ballot as an independent. The tactic enabled the incumbent mayor to avoid a crowded Democratic primary race that was shaping up as a referendum on the federal corruption charges he once faced and his growing ties to President Donald Trump.

The Adams campaign hired several companies to deploy employees across the city and gather signatures of registered voters in New York City who supported the mayor’s re-election.

Signature gatherers were required to sign a form pledging that each signature they collected was from the person whose name appeared on the sheet. But an executive from one company said he also warned the Adams campaign that it should run additional quality control measures – a suggestion he said the campaign rejected. In response to Gothamist’s inquiries, the campaign said it expected the companies it hired to follow the law but nevertheless pledged to now conduct its own review of the signatures….

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“‘Clinton Plan’ Emails Were Likely Made by Russian Spies, Declassified Report Shows”

chicanery

NYT:

The Trump-era special counsel who scoured the Russia investigation for wrongdoing gathered evidence that undermines a theory pushed by some Republicans that Hillary Clinton’s campaign conspired to frame Donald J. Trump for colluding with Moscow in the 2016 election, information declassified on Thursday shows.

The information, a 29-page annex to the special counsel’s 2023 report, reveals that a foundational document for that theory was most likely stitched together by Russian spies. The document is a purported email from July 27, 2016, that said Mrs. Clinton had approved a campaign proposal to tie Mr. Trump to Russia to distract from the scandal over her use of a private email server.

The release of the annex adds new details to the public’s understanding of a complex trove of 2016 Russian intelligence reports analyzing purported emails that Russian hackers stole from Americans. It also shows how the special counsel, John H. Durham, went to great lengths to try to prove that several of the emails were real, only to ultimately conclude otherwise….

Even as the releases shed more light on a seismic political period nearly a decade ago, Mr. Trump and his allies have wildly overstated what the documents show, accusing former President Barack Obama of “treason.”

The release of the annex was no exception. John Ratcliffe, the C.I.A. director, said in a statement that the materials proved that suspicions of Russian collusion stemmed from “a coordinated plan to prevent and destroy Donald Trump’s presidency.”

And Kash Patel, the F.B.I. director, who has a long history of pushing false claims about the Russia investigation, declared on social media that the annex revealed “evidence that the Clinton campaign plotted to frame President Trump and fabricate the Russia collusion hoax.”

In reality, the annex shows the opposite, indicating that a key piece of supposed evidence for the claim that Mrs. Clinton approved a plan to tie Mr. Trump to Russia is not credible: Mr. Durham concluded that the email from July 27, 2016, and a related one dated two days earlier were probably manufactured.

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“Smithsonian removes Trump from impeachment exhibit in American History Museum”

chicanery

Wapo:

The Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History in July removed references to President Donald Trump’s two impeachments from an exhibit display. A person familiar with the exhibit plans, who was not authorized to discuss them publicly, said the change came about as part of a content review that the Smithsonian agreed to undertake following pressure from the White House to remove an art museum director.

A temporary label including content about Trump’s impeachments had been on display since September 2021 at the Washington museum, a Smithsonian spokesperson told The Washington Post, adding that it was intended to be a short-term addition to address current events. Now, the exhibit notes that “only three presidents have seriously faced removal.”

In addition to describing Trump’s two impeachments, the temporary label — which read “Case under redesign (history happens)” — also offered information about the impeachments of presidents Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton as well as Richard M. Nixon, who would have faced impeachment had he not resigned. The Washington Post viewed a photograph of the temporary signage….

“In reviewing our legacy content recently, it became clear that the ‘Limits of Presidential Power’ section in The American Presidency: A Glorious Burden exhibition needed to be addressed,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “The section of this exhibition covers Congress, The Supreme Court, Impeachment, and Public Opinion. Because the other topics in this section had not been updated since 2008, the decision was made to restore the Impeachment case back to its 2008 appearance.”

The change coincides with broader concerns about political interference at the Smithsonian and how the institution charged with preserving American history could be shaped by the Trump Administration’s efforts to exert more control over its work.

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D.C. Bar Committee Recommends that Jeffrey Clark, Who Tried to Help Trump Subvert the 2020 Presidential Election, Be Disbarred

chicanery, election subversion risk

From the report and recommendation:

Having reviewed the record in this matter, including the parties’ arguments before the Board, we reject Respondentís procedural arguments and dispositive motions. On the merits, we conclude that Disciplinary Counsel proved by clear and convincing evidence that Respondent attempted to make intentionally false statements when he continued to advocate that the Justice Department issue a letter containing falsehoods. Although the hearing witnesses agreed that Respondent had sincere personal concerns about the integrity of the 2020 election, they also agreed that the Justice Department had not identified potentially outcome-determinative issues in Georgia or other states. Respondent knew that because Messrs. Rosen and Donoghue told him so. Thus, Respondentís conduct constituted an attempt to make intentionally false statements about the results of the Justice Department’s investigation. We agree with the Hearing Committee that Disciplinary Counsel failed to prove that Respondent attempted to seriously interfere with the administration of justice, although for different reasons.

A majority of the Board recommends that Respondent be disbarred. [Footnote: Two Board Members recommend that Respondent be suspended for three years and be required to prove his fitness to practice prior to reinstatement.] We recognize that there are no factually comparable prior disciplinary cases. But that is not surprising given the underlying facts. In making this recommendation, we are mindful of the need to maintain the integrity of the legal profession and deter the respondent and other attorneys from engaging in similar misconduct. Lawyers must observe the highest standard of professional conduct. At a minimum, they must be honest. While dishonesty is always intolerable, the facts here are significantly aggravating to warrant disbarment: Respondent was prepared to cause the Justice Department to tell a lie about the status of its investigation of an important national issue (the integrity of the 2020 Presidential election). Lawyers cannot advocate for any outcome based on false statements and they certainly cannot urge others to do so. Respondent persistently and energetically sought to do just that on an important national issue. He should be disbarred as a consequence and to send a message to the rest of the Bar and to the public that this behavior will not be tolerated.

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“Despite grand claims, a new report shows noncitizen voting hasn’t materialized”

chicanery, election administration, fraudulent fraud squad

Miles Parks for NPR:

After President Trump and many other Republicans warned that vast numbers of non-U.S. citizens would influence last year’s election, states and law enforcement have devoted more resources than ever before to root out those ineligible voters.

More than six months into Trump’s second term, they haven’t found much.

New research out Wednesday tracking state government efforts across the country confirms what election experts have said all along: Noncitizen voting occasionally happens but in minuscule numbers, and not in any coordinated way.

“Noncitizens are not a large threat to our election system currently,” said David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation & Research (CEIR), which conducted the research. “Even states that are looking everywhere to try to amplify the numbers of noncitizens … when they actually look, they find a surprisingly, shockingly small number.”

CEIR spent roughly four months reviewing states’ public disclosures about noncitizen voting, stretching back years. The organization shared its findings with NPR exclusively.

The report shows a wide disparity in how states have investigated the issue and what data officials in those states choose to make public. Many states have released no information, even though it’s illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections and all voting officials do some type of maintenance to their voter rolls.

Some states, such as Michigan and Georgia, have undertaken audits of their entire voter rolls, using resources from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to check for noncitizens. Michigan officials announced in April that a review found that “cases of noncitizens casting a ballot in Michigan elections are extremely rare.” The review found more than a dozen noncitizens appear to have illegally voted in the 2024 general election. That’s 0.00028% of the state’s total votes….

No state has found any coordinated effort to get noncitizens to vote in the 2024 election.

When UCLA election law professor Rick Hasen was presented with the CEIR findings, he said he wasn’t “surprised in the slightest.”

“It really is not a big problem, both because on the individual level, it would be hard to get noncitizens to agree to it,” Hasen said. “And on the broader level, it’s just not a very cost-effective way to try to steal an election.”

Election officials note there are safeguards to prevent noncitizens from registering to vote, but the biggest deterrent is the fact that immigrants without legal status generally don’t want to risk deportation to cast one ballot — especially because the inherent paper trail of voting makes it very easy to get caught.

Separate research has found that when noncitizens do register to vote, it’s often due to bureaucratic errors or a misunderstanding about eligibility, as opposed to intentional fraud.

Still, the noncitizen voting myth has persisted for more than 100 years in American elections. Hasen expects it to come up again in 2026, even if states don’t find any data to support it.

“Most people who make claims that noncitizen voting is a big problem are doing so for political purposes,” Hasen said. “It’s a way of demonizing immigrants. It’s a way of trying to claim that Democrats cheat. And no amount of evidence is going to stop people from making politically expedient claims.”

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Ellen Katz: “Redistricting Texas Now is Illegal and the U.S. Department of Justice is the Reason Why”

chicanery, direct democracy, Voting Rights Act

Ellen Katz has posted this draft on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

The U.S. Department of Justice sent a letter to the Texas Governor and Attorney General that claims four Texas congressional districts violate the Voting Rights Act and the Constitution. The letter seemingly demands that Texas alter the racial makeup of those districts. This short essay shows why the legal claims set forth in the DOJ letter are incorrect and why Texas would violate both the VRA and the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause were it to change its districting map to target these four districtsin response to the DOJ letter.



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North Carolina: “All-GOP Appeals Court panel ruled against Stein in elections board dispute”

chicanery, election administration

Carolina Journal:

Three Republican members of the North Carolina Court of Appeals issued the April order that blocked a lower court ruling favoring Democratic Gov. Josh Stein in a dispute over state elections board appointments.

Appeals Court rules blocked release of the names of participating judges for 90 days. Now the court has revealed that Judges Julee Flood, Michael Stading, and Tom Murry issued the April 30 order.

All three are Republicans. Republicans outnumber Democrats, 12-3, on the state’s second-highest court.

The Appeals Court’s action paved the way for State Auditor Dave Boliek to make new appointments to state and county elections boards. The state Supreme Court later split, 5-2, in upholding appellate judges’ decision.

Boliek is a Republican. His appointments shifted elections board majorities from 3-2 in Democrats’ favor to 3-2 Republican majorities. Among the state board’s first actions was to replace executive director Karen Brinson Bell with Sam Hayes.

The legal dispute remains with the state Appeals Court.

The state Supreme Court decision split justices along party lines. The five Republicans made up the majority. The two Democrats dissented….

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“DOJ Is Said to Plan to Contact All 50 States on Voting Systems”

chicanery, Department of Justice, election administration

Democracy Docket:

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has said it intends to contact all 50 states about their compliance with federal voting law, a national association of state election officials told Democracy Docket. 

“As states recently began to receive letters on the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) and Help America Vote Act (HAVA) from the U.S. Department of Justice, NASS staff reached out to hopefully provide members with additional information and context,” Maria Benson, a spokesperson for the National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS) said in a statement. “DOJ staff told NASS staff that all states would be contacted eventually on NVRA and HAVA matters. We passed along this information to members.”

“NASS staff has also asked DOJ to join a future NASS Elections Committee virtual meeting to address questions on these letters,” Benson added.

In recent weeks, letters sent by DOJ’s Civil Rights division to numerous states of all political stripes have asked for sensitive voter roll data, which DOJ has said is needed to ensure compliance with the NVRA and HAVA. The inquiries appear intended to gather information that could boost the Trump administration’s hunt for illegal voting.

“Most of the letters are very vague about why the DOJ is asking for this data,” Justin Levitt, a constitutional law scholar and a former deputy assistant attorney general in the DOJ’s Civil Rights division, as well as a former voting adviser to former President Joe Biden, told Democracy Docket. “Most of these letters cite generally HAVA and the NVRA. That’s not good enough. HAVA and the NVRA have very particular requirements for state and local jurisdictions.”…

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“Justice department asked California to give info on non-citizens on voter rolls”

chicanery, Department of Justice, election administration

The Guardian:

The Department of Justice has asked several large California counties to provide detailed personal information of non-citizens who got on to the state voter rolls, an unusual request that comes as the Trump administration has asked about a dozen states to provide wide swaths of information about voters and election practices.

The justice department’s voting section sent identical letters to local election officials in Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego on 9 July. The request asks the officials to provide the total number of non-citizens who had their voter registrations cancelled since 2020 as well as a copy of their voter registration records, voting history, date of birth, driver’s license numbers, and the last four digits of a social security number. The department sent a similar request to Orange county last month and then sued the county after officials redacted some information….

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“Project Veritas Withdraws Lawsuit Against The New York Times”

cheap speech, chicanery

NYT:

The conservative group Project Veritas this week dropped its yearslong libel lawsuit against The New York Times.

The lawsuit accused The Times of defamation for an article published in 2020 that reported that researchers from Stanford University and the University of Washington had described some videos produced by Project Veritas as probably part of a coordinated disinformation effort. The group also sued the researchers.

Project Veritas lost its defamation claims against the university researchers in 2022, and was ordered to pay Stanford nearly $150,000 in legal fees. But the group had continued to pursue its claims against The Times after defeating the news organization’s motion to dismiss.

“We are pleased that Project Veritas decided to withdraw its libel suit without any settlement,” Charlie Stadtlander, a Times spokesman, said in a statement, adding, “The claim against The Times should never have been brought.”

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