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The Pennsylvania Senate Intergovernmental Operations Committee voted in agreement with the parties to authorize a high-profile subpoena against the Pennsylvania State Department. The request covers a range of voter data – including voters’ names, addresses, driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers. The demand covers not only the nearly 7 million Pennsylvanians who voted in November 2020, but all of the roughly 9 million registered voters in the state.
The summons also covers a wide range of election-related information, such as communications between the State Department and county election officials, information on the training of election officials, and a copy of certified election results for all. the races in the general elections of 2020 and the primaries of 2021. elections.
“There have been questions about the validity of the people who were – who voted – whether or not they exist,” Dush said. “Again, we are not responding to proven claims. We are investigating the claims to determine whether or not they are factual.”
Dush insisted that the outcome of the partisan election review would help the Senate determine whether legislative changes needed to be made before the next election.
Despite the claims of Republicans on the committee, there was no indication of significant voter fraud in Pennsylvania or any other state. But the vote is the latest indication of how Republicans in a handful of states across the country have passed so-called audits to question the 2020 presidential outcome and appease the former president. Donald Trump and his supporters.
Pro Tempore Senate Speaker Jake Corman, a Republican, said the review would help allay fears of fraud among Pennsylvania voters – although he did not acknowledge that these unfounded allegations came from leaders of his own. party amplifying fraud allegations.
“Either we improve our laws or we take a lot of the concerns of the people of Pennsylvania away,” Corman said.
State Senator Anthony H. Williams, the top Democrat on the Senate panel, accused Republicans suing the audit of carrying a “torch to democracy.”
Democrats on the Senate committee also raised concerns about providing addresses, driver’s license information and partial Social Security numbers to Republicans on the committee as well as vendors selected to perform the service. saying audit.
“We don’t need a voter’s name, address, driver’s license number or social security number to draft a law on any subject,” the senator said. State Vincent Hughes, a Democrat.
Dush said he and his legal team would select suppliers to run the business, but they have yet to make a final decision.
Dush could not guarantee that the vendors will not have ties to political candidates – including presidential candidates – who ran last November. He also couldn’t say whether he would rule out companies with ties to Sidney Powell, who was previously a member of Trump’s legal team.
“We live in a world where people are becoming more and more actively involved in the political sphere,” Dush said, but added that he wanted Pennsylvanians to have confidence in the results of the audit led by the GOP.
“The verification process will be rigorous,” Dush said of potential suppliers. “I am not going to hire political activists to become investigators.”
Dush said the election review would be taxpayer funded, but when asked if it would run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars or potentially millions of dollars, he was unable to provide a estimated cost.
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, a Democrat, criticized the Senate committee’s vote on Wednesday in a statement.
“Let’s be very clear, this request for information is just one more step to undermine democracy, confidence in our elections and to capitulate to Donald Trump’s conspiracy theories on the 2020 election,” Wolf said. . “This is a direct continuation of the same lies that led to the attack on Capitol Hill, and which have done so much to destabilize our political institutions in the ten months since last year’s election.”
Democrats on the Senate committee said they plan to take legal action to challenge the summons. It is not known how the Pennsylvania State Department will react.
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