Alabama Secretary Of State Discovers Popular Leftist Voter-Roll Group’s Address Is Bogus
While visiting the U.S. capital last week, Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen decided to make an impromptu visit to the headquarters of a widely used voter-roll management group with ties to left-wing activists. There was just one problem: He found no trace of the organization at its listed address.
“I was in DC for a meeting of the National Association of Secretaries of States and, since I was in town, I went to see the [Electronic Registration Information Center] Headquarters,” Allen said in a statement. “What I found was that there was no ERIC headquarters at that address. There were no employees. There were no servers. There was no ERIC presence of any kind. Instead, I found a virtual office that is rentable by the day. What it was missing was people, servers and any sign of the ERIC team.”
As The Federalist’s Victoria Marshall reported, ERIC is a voter-roll management system founded by far-left activist David Becker that was sold to states as a “quick and easy way” to manage their voter rolls. When states become ERIC members, they give voter data to the group — including the records of unregistered voters. Currently, ERIC has control of voter-roll data in more than half of states and the District of Columbia.
While ERIC’s website lists a D.C. address in its “Contact Us” section, Allen claims the location listed is actually operated by Expansive, a business that provides virtual workspaces across the nation and rents office space on a daily basis.
“Before I took office, Alabama transmitted the personal information of millions of our citizens to this private organization for the past several years. That information is stored on a server somewhere but we do not know where. There is no ERIC operation at the location they claim is their office,” Allen said. “A lot of personal data and taxpayer money has been transferred to ERIC. Where is that data? Where are the employees? Where are the offices? Where are the computers?”
In response to Allen’s claims, an ERIC spokesman told The Federalist the organization “has always operated without a brick-and-mortar office” and the address listed on its website “is ERIC’s official mailing address.”
“ERIC utilizes a secure data center outside of Washington, D.C.,” he said. “ERIC staff work remotely from other U.S. locations.”
Upon being sworn in as secretary of state earlier this year, Allen formally withdrew Alabama from ERIC, fulfilling a pledge he made prior to taking office. In a statement announcing the decision, Allen cited concern with Alabama sending voter data to out-of-state organizations, saying “the data uploads of [private] information from Alabama to ERIC is over.”
ERIC also has alarming ties to another Becker-founded left-wing nonprofit known as the Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR). Most notably, CEIR was one of the major groups that received millions of dollars from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in the lead-up to the 2020 election.
Such grants were then poured into local election offices throughout the country to push Democrat-backed voting policies. Analyses have shown these “Zuckbucks” were heavily skewed toward Democrat municipalities, especially in swing states, effectively making it a giant Democrat “get out the vote” operation.
As The Federalist reported, ERIC transmits the voter-roll data it receives from states to CEIR, which “then develops targeted mailing lists and sends them back to the states to use for voter registration outreach.”
“As part of their agreement with ERIC, states are not allowed to disclose any data they send to nor receive from ERIC, however, ERIC is not under the same constraints and is able to work with CEIR,” the report reads.
Shawn Fleetwood is a Staff Writer for The Federalist and a graduate of the University of Mary Washington. He also serves as a state content writer for Convention of States Action and his work has been featured in numerous outlets, including RealClearPolitics, RealClearHealth, and Conservative Review. Follow him on Twitter @ShawnFleetwood
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