Wyden Demands Answers from Social Security Commissioner Over Trump Directive to Create Unconstitutional National Voter Database

Wyden Demands Answers from Social Security Commissioner Over Trump Directive to Create Unconstitutional National Voter Database

Recent executive order on mail-in voting would require a data sharing agreement between SSA and DHS to establish a national voter list, potentially violating the Privacy Act

Washington, D.C. - Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden, D-Ore., today demanded answers from the Social Security Administration (SSA) over Donald Trump's recent executive order to suppress mail-in voting ahead of the November midterm elections, which would require SSA to share citizenship data with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to establish a list of eligible voters in the United States.

"This latest brazen attempt to create a national voter database aims to undermine the rights of states to conduct their own elections, including manage their registered voter lists, and use private SSA data as a backdoor to give Donald Trump power over who is eligible to vote in federal elections," Wyden wrote in his letter to Social Security commissioner Frank Bisignano. "Facilitating Donald Trump's directive to create a flawed voter database would be willing participation in blatant voter suppression ahead of consequential midterm elections."

The Trump administration has tried repeatedly to force states to hand over their voter registration lists, raising significant privacy and security concerns, and in direct violation of the constitution, which explicitly grants states the power to establish the times, places, and manner of elections, including creating and managing voter lists. The creation of a national voter database would give the Trump administration unprecedented access to private voter data. The SAVE America Act, currently being considered by the Senate, contains a similar provision that would compel states to share their voter registration lists with DHS to verify the citizenship of registered voters.

Oregon is one of nine states that currently conducts its elections entirely by mail. Despite consistent claims by Donald Trump that mail-in voting leads to higher cases of voter fraud, states that use it experience fewer instances of voter fraud than any other system. A review of the vote by mail system by Oregon's Legislative Fiscal Office found from 2000-2019 there were approximately 61 million ballots cast. Of those, 38 criminal convictions of voter fraud were obtained, amounting to a .00006% fraud rate.

"This is a desperate last-ditch effort by a failing president to suppress American votes because his agenda of pardoning pedophiles, embarking on his Iran war and ripping away health care is about to lose him the midterms," Wyden said earlier this week of Trump's executive order.

The letter to Bisignano is here.