Election Watch 2022: CTCL's New Election Meddling Coalition, Biden Tries to Federalize Voter Registration & the Hillsborough County SOE's Been Sued

 

CTCL (Center for Tech and Civic Life) is the highly partisan Democrat aligned nonprofit where Mark Zuckerberg dumped at least $350 million to influence the 2020 election. CTCL was founded in 2012 by Tiana Epps-Johnson, a partisan who trained Progressive organizers and Democrat Party operatives. 

Aa a result of the "ZuckBucks" shenanigans in 2020, a number of States, including Florida, enacted new laws prohibiting the use of private money on election activities.

Such laws are not stopping CTCL or their Progressive partners from more election meddling in 2022. 

With $80 Million of funding from the Audacious Project, CTCL launched in April their latest initiative: The U.S. Alliance for Election Excellence. 

This Alliance is targeting "election administration". Partisan Epps-Johnson, who was invited in 2018 by former President Obama to be an inaugural member of his Obama Foundation Fellowship, wants to "restore trust in our democracy" by telling election officials how to "better" run their elections. 

The Alliance will select local election offices to be part of their "Center for Election Excellence" program. Any election official who receives backlash for participating in the Alliance  program will receive "guidance and resources" for how to combat "misinformation. 

At Stanford last year Epps-Johnson introduced Obama when he spoke there - ironically - about "disinformation". She also sits on the boards of City Bureau, a Chicago-based community organizing group, and the Center for Civic Design who recommends all voters vote by mail.

Highly partisan Epps-Johnson calls her new Alliance "the next phase of what we do need at this moment and how we can show up with the right tools". 

But is it really just CTCL's attempt to skirt or do an end-around the new laws passed since 2020?

It appears for now Mark Zuckerberg is not funding CTCL's "next phase". But CTCL is very intertwined with highly partisan Democrat aligned organizations with deep pockets.

A recent PJ Media post reported what the Public Interest Legal Foundation found as a result of their many Freedom of Information (FOIA) requests. 

While no election official in a state that now prohibits private funding of elections has applied for new funding, something stranger, and more dangerous has emerged from the public information requests.

In one email, we find that the Democracy Fund—a hyper-funded progressive money source—is organizing state officials and third parties to discuss election administration.

The Democracy Fund email included Hillsborough County SOE Craig Latimer. The Democracy Fund supports efforts to change our electoral system. 

Tammy Patrick is a Board member of CTCL and a senior advisor to the Democracy Fund. In 2013, Patrick was selected to be a member of former President Obama's Presidential Commission on Voting Administration that Obama created thru an executive order. Obama's Commission recommended online voter registration and expanding voter registration in other government offices. 

In March last year Biden signed an executive order requesting all 600 Federal agencies become voter registration offices. The federal agencies were requested to send their "voter registration" plans to Biden's hyper-partisan Domestic Policy Advisor Susan Rice. Rice was Obama's then UN Ambassador who lied to the American people in 2012 about Benghazi and then Obama promoted her in 2013 to be his National Security Advisor - a position not requiring Senate approval. 

As reported recently by The Federalists' Mollie Hemingway, Progressive partisan third parties are on board with Biden's efforts to federalize our elections. However, the Biden WH and the federal agencies are "refusing to share details about how they’re complying with the executive order, who they met with to develop their plans, or how they’re justifying their involvement in something Congress has not authorized them to participate in.."

What a coincidence! As Hemingway pointed out, Biden's executive order looks like it was taken from a white paper written in December 2020 by Demos, a Leftist organization. 

After Biden's EO was signed, Demos wrote a subsequent policy brief Federal Agency Voter Registration. Demos policy brief outlines the steps that should be taken by all 600 Federal Agencies:

I. Incorporate effective and accessible voter registration services into all relevant agency interactions, including distributing voter registration applications and providing assistance to all clients and constituents

II. Establish a system for collecting and securely transmitting completed voter registration applications to election officials

III. Appoint a coordinator to oversee and manage voter registration services

IV. Obtain guidance from the EAC, from state / local election officials, and, where appropriate, form community groups

V. Provide robust, regular training for agency staff

VI. Collect and report aggregate data on agency registrations 

VII. Provide accessible voter education materials

These activities are way outside the bounds of the responsibilities of the Federal agencies. Congress has never appropriated or authorized the use of Federal funds by these agencies on voter registration activities. 

It is NOT the responsibility of Federal agencies and/or the Executive Branch of government to administer and manage voter registration and election activities. In 1939 Congress passed the Hatch Act which bans bureaucrats and bureaucracies from being involved in election activities. 

Is CTCL and CEIR, who together received almost a HALF BILLION dollars of "ZuckBucks" in 2020, a part of the third party organizations advising the Biden Admin for how to comply with the EO?  

Perhaps this is why the Biden Admin and the Federal agencies are refusing to tell Congress or the American people how and what the agencies are actually doing to comply with Biden's EO. This is dangerous, breeds distrust and hands unauthorized power to unelected bureaucrats and unaccountable partisan third party organizations. 

Multiple lawsuits have now been filed to compel Biden's Justice Department to respond to the numerous FOIA requests that are being ignored.

Locally, voters in Hillsborough should be concerned. Emails received via public records request reveal Democrat Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections (SOE) Craig Latimer has had a relationship with CTCL since 2014 - his first general election as SOE. It appears their relationship continues today when it should be severed.

In addition the "ZuckBucks" lawsuit filed against Latimer's SOE reveals his office has relationships with other partisans. The partisans were advising Latimer's SOE office to take the "ZuckBucks" grant right AFTER the SOE's office had publicly stated they were fully funded and did not need the money. 

What is Latimer's relationship with the Democracy Fund, how long has he had that relationship and why does he have that relationship? How many other partisan Democrat aligned organizations does Latimer and his SOE office have relationships with?  

In 2020 Latimer never informed the voting public he took the $2.9 Million "ZuckBucks" grant from the highly partisan CTCL. 

Latimer never informed voters he handed PR/Marking firm Vistra Communications a "ZuckBucks" $2.6 Million no bid contract to launch a GOTV campaign. 

Why did Latimer select Vistra? Because Brian Butler was "fully dedicated to the philosophy and importance of his Get Out the Vote Campaign? 

What is that "philosophy"? Why was it so important for Latimer to launch the GOTV campaign in the last weeks before the 2020 election?

Honesty is always the best policy. But Latimer has never been upfront and honest with the public about his "ZuckBucks" grant or the GOTV campaign.

More transparency is needed from SOE's in Florida. Every SOE should be required to put their financials, yearly budget, revenue and expenditures online for public access - just like other taxpayer funded entities do.

 

Hillsborough County voters deserve transparency and accountability regarding ALL actions taken and all expenditures made by Latimer and his office. That same transparency and accountability is required of any third party, such as Vistra, doing work on behalf of the SOE.

Biden is overreaching trying to federalize voter registration across 600 Federal agencies. CTCL's newly funded Alliance is again targeting local SOE's to influence their "election administration" activities. 

And Craig Latimer may have a crisis of confidence if there is public doubts about his integrity, ethics and relationships with highly partisan organizations.  

There must be no election meddling by outside third parties in any of our elections in Florida. So stay vigilant!

And watch the 2022 election with eagle eyes.