Earlier this month, 15 secretaries of state from across the country released a letter calling on President Joe Biden to rescind Executive Order 14019, “Promoting Access to Voting,” which unlawfully inserts the president’s political appointees into the election process. The Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA) applauds these secretaries of state for resisting this illegal and unconstitutional power grab by the White House.
Executive Order 14019 requires federal agencies to develop plans to register and mobilize voters and submit these plans to the president’s Domestic Policy Advisor, Susan Rice. The letter rightly condemns this order as unconstitutional under the Constitution’s “Times, Places and Manner of Elections” clause, which reserves the power of administering and running state elections explicitly to state legislatures.
Signatories include Secretaries John Merrill (Alabama), John Thurston (Arkansas), Cord Byrd (Florida), Brad Raffensberger (Georgia), Lawrence Denney (Idaho), Holli Sullivan (Indiana), Kyle Ardoin (Louisiana), Michael Watson (Mississippi), Christi Jacobsen (Montana), Bob Evnen (Nebraska), Frank LaRose (Ohio), Steve Barnett (South Dakota), Tre Hargett (Tennessee), Mac Warner (West Virginia), and Ed Buchanan (Wyoming).
“President Biden’s executive order blatantly involves political appointees in federal agencies—whose job security depends on the incumbent party’s reelection—in voter registration and mobilization,” said Tarren Bragdon, FGA President and CEO. “We applaud this courageous step toward preserving election integrity and the right and duty of state legislatures to run their own elections.”
