The Lethal Mix of Trump Nationalizing Our Elections and DOGE Stealing Our Personal Data
The combination puts the nail in the coffin of Democracy
The Tale of Two Data Sets
After learning that Trump is publicly calling on Republicans to “take over elections,” as I sat in the airport yesterday, I began to hear multiple related conversations.
Usually something along the lines of, “…did you hear Trump is pushing for the federal government to run elections?” To which — not once, not twice, but three times — I heard the same response: “Doesn’t the government already run our elections?” In most of these exchanges, someone would correct them and say, “No. Each state runs elections regardless of whether it is a federal or state race.”
That is the good news. Half of the people understand that states control elections based on the Constitution and for good reason. The president should never control elections, because that is what dictators do.
Within an hour, the news broke about Trump’s team admitting they had misused and dispersed Social Security and IRS data. Accordingly, folks were talking about it in the airport. I heard more than once: “Did you hear DOGE really did take our Social Security and IRS data and share it with private agencies and organizations? The administration admitted it in court.” To which most people responded, “…well, doesn’t Google have all our info anyway?” While Google does own a great deal of data about our behavior and habits, it does not have Social Security and private financial information on each of us.
Some solace to report here:the lawsuits are ongoing, but distribution of those SS and IRS data sets have been frozen to any group other than the federal government, for now. Similarly, Congress has called for an investigation.
The bad news is this administration’s behavior is neither predictable or compliant.
So effectively we have two important data sets in jeopardy in our country:
State voter rolls and electoral data
Social Security and IRS data
Why This Is Worrisome
Access by the administration to both Social Security data and state voter rolls is incredibly risky because it consolidates highly sensitive personal information, creating significant, multifaceted dangers regarding privacy, identity theft, and election integrity. This combination could be misused to target voters based on political affiliation, facilitate unlawful surveillance, or result in the wrongful purging of eligible voters from registration lists.
We all witnessed in the last few weeks as this administration and DOJ tried to obtain Minnesota’s voter rolls in exchange for ending his domestic army’s actions (ICE and CBP). Minnesota did not comply for the following reasons.
Top reasons this is dangerous:
Massive Risk of Data Breach and Identity Theft: Combining Social Security numbers (SSNs), dates of birth, and addresses from both databases creates a “goldmine” for hackers, foreign adversaries, or malicious insiders. Whistleblower reports indicate that members of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) placed sensitive Social Security data of hundreds of millions of Americans on unsecured third-party cloud servers, leaving them vulnerable to theft, and then shared server access with private agencies.
Widespread Voter Disenfranchisement: Social Security Administration (SSA) records regarding citizenship are often outdated, as naturalized citizens may not immediately notify the SSA. Using this faulty data to cross-check voter rolls can cause legitimate citizens to be flagged as non-citizens and removed from the rolls, violating their right to vote.
Political Targeting and Surveillance: Combining these data allows for the creation of a centralized federal database, facilitating surveillance of voters and potential targeting based on political affiliation. Such action threatens the independence of election administration, moving it away from state control.
Erosion of Public Trust in Democracy: The use of this data to fuel false narratives about rampant illegal voting can undermine trust in the democratic process. Reports indicate that members of the administration worked with advocacy groups to search for evidence to “overturn election results” rather than to maintain accurate records.
Unlawful Data Misuse: The aggregation of this data may violate the Privacy Act of 1974, which restricts how federal agencies collect and store personally identifiable information (PII).
In short, no federal administration should be trusted with running elections.
What Can Be Done?
Contact your governor, states attorney general, state legislators, and secretary of state to compel them to protect voter rolls and maintain control of all electoral systems at the state level as prescribed by the U.S. Constitution.
During the primaries, bring your phone to record any intimidation or interference at your polling location.
Report all intimidation, attempts at interference, or suppression.
Make sure everyone you know has a plan for voting (when, where, and how).
Okay folks, let’s get out the vote.
M.
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While collecting signatures for candidates we found some people, who should have been registered, were not. We live in Ohio, where all of the office holders you mention, ALL of them, support Trump. The best we can do is to check frequently that we are still registered. It looks like county election boards, both the Democratic and the Republican representative, will need to take all ballots to a vault after voting is completed every day.
I’ve been reading about potential charges of “Misprision of Treason” which I hadn’t heard of before.
“Anyone with knowledge of treason who fails to report it can be charged with misprision of treason, punishable by up to seven years in prison.”
Misprision of treason got my attention because, as a middle school guidance counselor, I was responsible for HIB investigations (harassment, intimidation, bullying). I had the best outcomes when I started at the bottom instead of going for the kingpin. It didn’t take long for the house of cards to collapse.