For secretary of state Maggie Toulouse Oliver, this is the busy season. With the general election a few weeks away, she and her staff have their hands full preparing for a close presidential election and the usual mix of national and local races.
But this is New Mexico, and the secretary of state always seems to have to deal with a lot of other unusual developments.
Two years ago, on top of the normal responsibilities, her list of concerns included a county commission refusing to certify a vote, shootings at the homes of elected officials, and threats to her own safety via phone calls and email.
About two weeks ago, she and five other secretaries of state were testifying in Washington on election integrity. A few days ago, the state won a case against a group acting as a political action committee without revealing the identity of its donors.
Toulouse Oliver usually wins these kinds of cases. But a recent loss in a case against the Voter Reference Foundation allowed that organization to publish the names, party affiliations, and addresses of every registered voter in New Mexico.
Propublica reports that the R epublican-backed VoteRef initiative is encouraging crowdsourcing of voter rolls to find what they consider errors and anomalies.
The federal court decision to allow the information to be published online has left Toulouse Oliver and New Mexico voters concerned about privacy and safety.
“The worst part is we have people coming to us saying, ‘Can I take myself off the list now?’ And of course that’s the last thing we want,” Toulouse Oliver said.
“We don’t want voters to come off the list. We want them to be able to participate. But sadly what we have to say to them is, ‘Well, you can. We don’t want you to. But it’s also too late. Once the information is out there you can’t claw it back from the internet.’”
In an interview this week with KSFR, Toulouse Oliver said that disallowing publication of the information was in accordance with state law, but it was overruled by a federal judge. Several other states, including Pennsylvania, have also recently fought against the effort to publish voter rolls at voteref. com.
New Mexico’s decision to fight against VoteRef publishing the voter rolls was due to the organization not getting the information directly from the state and because it wasn’t being used for a governmental or campaign purpose, Toulouse Oliver said.
The secretary of state said the state is complying with the order but planning to appeal it.
