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TONY MITCHELL FAR AWAY FROM HOME REGISTRATION

Louisiana was the first state to pull out of ERIC, in early 2022. Louisiana Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin hosts the summer conference of the National Association of Secretaries of State in Baton Rouge, La., on July 8, 2022.

This NPR investigation, which found video of the Houma event posted to Facebook, is the first to report that Ardoin announced his ERIC decision to conservative activists.Īnd a deeper look at the red-state exodus that followed - eight states and counting have now pulled out of ERIC - shows a policy blueprint for an election denial movement, spearheaded by a key Trump ally, eager to change virtually every aspect of how Americans vote. It was the first of many times to come in which Republican officials would turn their back on this tool they once praised, in an effort to score political points with their base. 'This week I sent a letter to, suspending Louisiana's participation in that program,' Ardoin said.Īt the time, in early 2022, most Americans had never heard of ERIC.īut in Houma, it seems in large part due to a far-right misinformation machine, Ardoin's announcement garnered 15 seconds of applause. And election officials widely agree it helps to identify dead people on voting lists.

TONY MITCHELL FAR AWAY FROM HOME REGISTRATION

He was making an announcement: Louisiana would become the first state ever to pull out of an obscure bipartisan voting partnership known as the Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC.ĮRIC is currently the only system that can catch if someone votes in more than one state, which is illegal. 'I think one of the reasons we had so much distrust from this past election was because all of a sudden either over the course of the night, or in the wee hours of the morning, votes were discovered,' said one man, repeating a common false claim about how votes were tallied in 2020.īut Ardoin wasn't just dropping by to talk about electronic voting machines or mail ballot fraud.

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The group hosting the event - We The People, Bayou Chapter - is one of hundreds of so-called election integrity groups that have popped up across the country since 2020, motivated by former President Donald Trump's lies about voting.ĭuring the Q&A portion of the event, people asked about how to stop dead people from voting 'to support the Democrats' and voiced a number of other popular election conspiracy theories.

'I want to thank you all for coming out, competing with Joe Burrow is pretty tough!' Ardoin laughed. The state's chief voting official joked that he was competing with a former LSU Tiger great playing in the NFL playoffs the same night. With American flags draped from the stage, the topic of the night was democracy. On a night in January 2022, Louisiana Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin stepped on stage in a former airbase in Houma, La. Eight states where Republicans oversee voting have so far pulled out. But since early 2022, the far right has targeted ERIC, fracturing a partnership that had 32 member states at its height. The Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC, has for years operated as a bipartisan success story in election administration.

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