For the second time, a federal commission is asking the Illinois State Board of Elections to send information about registered voters. And for the second time, US Senator Dick Durbin is asking the board to refuse.
A statement from Durbin's office says the first request from the Presidential Commission on Election Integrity said the voter information would have been made public. So, the Illinois elections board refused to comply.
Last month, the commission asked for the voter data again, saying "personally identifiable" voter information will not be made public. But Durbin still wants the board to reject the commission's request.
In a letter to the state board, Durbin calls the commission a "farce," and "nothing more than a baseless, half-baked exercise designed to further undermine the public's confidence in the credibility of our elections." The US senator from Illinois also says it's a waste of money and extremely partisan. He wants an independent, bipartisan investigation of last year's presidential election.
The Illinois State Board of Elections will consider the commission's second request at its meeting tomorrow morning.
