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AP17:064

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 12, 2017
Contact:
Jesse Melgar or Sam Mahood
(916) 653-6575

California Secretary of State Alex Padilla Statement on Today’s Election Commission Meeting

California Secretary of State Alex Padilla issued the following statement following the second meeting of the President’s Advisory Commission on Election Integrity. 

“Today’s commission meeting is just the latest effort by Mr. Trump and Kris Kobach to suppress the voting rights of eligible American citizens. The Trump and Kobach commission should be shut down before it can cause lasting harm to our democracy. Congress should take action to defund the commission without delay.” 

“Today’s commission meeting was absent any testimony from women or people of color. Yet, the commission did include testimony suggesting that American citizens should be required to pass a background check before being allowed to vote. Kobach failed to call out this offensive proposal; which shouldn’t be a surprise as Kobach has also been moonlighting as a columnist for Breitbart.”  

“I will continue to refuse to comply with this commission’s requests for voter data because it would compromise the privacy of California voters and because the commission has no authority. It is clear that this commission has but one goal—to suppress the vote and undermine voting rights.” 

“Strangely, the issue of Russian tampering in our elections has not been a focus of the commission. Why is that? For a commission formed to investigate election integrity to ignore Russian tampering and instead demand personal information from American citizens is unbelievable.” 

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