Who's behind the mysterious "robo-calls" that have spread misleading voter information and sown confusion and frustration among North Carolina residents over the last week?
Facing South has confirmed the source of the calls, and the mastermind is Women's Voices Women Vote, a D.C.-based nonprofit which aims to boost voting among "unmarried women voters."
What's more, Facing South has learned that the firestorm Women's Voices has ignited in North Carolina isn't the group's first brush with controversy. Women's Voices' questionable tactics have spawned thousands of voter complaints in at least 11 states and brought harsh condemnation from some election officials for their secrecy, misleading nature and likely violations of election law.
Shocking to see who is on the board of this organization -- John Podesta and one Michael Lux, a founding partner of this site.
Would love to see some commentary on this from the top.
Does that group doing voter-suppression calls in North Carolina have ties to the Clinton campaign?
The analysis done by Facing South seems to indicate the possibility.
UPDATE: This story is picking up steam, quickly, as evidenced by the story's crossposts at Daily Kos and MyDD, where judgment is flying fast and furiously.
I have been working at home today, completely focused on a May 1 deadline, but was just made aware of the controversy regarding Women's Voices. Women Vote. (Disclosure: I am on their board.) I called Page Gardner and have had a quick conversation with her as well as seen the statement that she released. I am completely confident that this was an accident. As far as I can tell, I think it was more a consequence of trying to move on 24 states in a short amount of time, and having nothing to do with the upcoming primary.
I have known Page Gardner for 16 years. She has dedicated her life to trying to get folks to register to vote, and would never do anything to deter anyone from voting.
I am still gathering facts, as to what happened and as to what the exact sequence of events was. As soon as I know more details I will do another post on what I learn.
In the meantime, I think that it's entirely possible that busy folks were a little bit asleep at the switch in this situation, but I really don't think there was any bad intent here.
UPDATE 3: The WVWV mailer, or at least a scanned copy of one sent to a home in Oregon, is up for perusal at TPM Muckraker. I should also note their original post and its comment thread, which contains some damage control attempts by Sarah Johnson of WVWV. Read it and judge for yourself.
UPDATE 4: Facing South, where the story originated, says the NC Attorney General has called WVWV's calls "violated the law".
UPDATE 5:Matt Stoller adds some damage control to the mix; Facing South reports that MSHC Partners was responsible for WVWV's voter outreach:
At the same time, MSHC also does direct mail and outreach for the Hillary Clinton campaign. In fact, the campaign owes MSHC $807,000, according to Politico.com.
UPDATE 6: Kossack stefanielaine gets a response from John Podesta that sounds a lot like Mike Lux's:
Believe me, you were no more shocked than I was. WVWV has a strong record of registering disenfranchised people so that they can participate in the political process. Over 400,000 in this cycle. With respect to North Carolina, remedial action is being undertaken. While I believe the calling program there was a mistake of judgment and execution, and not an attempt to disenfranchise voters, as a board member, I have asked for a full accounting of the circumstances of the North Carolina events.
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