Groups like AARP, ACLU push harder for Biden admin to increase immigrant, prison voting ahead of 2024

Another so-called “conspiracy theory” appears to be coming true — this time, regarding voting and the 2024 elections.

A coalition comprised of more than 50 left-wing organizations — including AARP, the ACLU, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, the League of Women Voters, and the NAACP  — is pushing the Biden administration to increase voter registration and turnout among new immigrants and those who are currently in federal custody awaiting their trials ahead of the all-important 2024 elections.

The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights published a progress report titled “Strengthening Democracy,” in which it calls on federal agencies to “work quickly to do everything they can” to make good on their commitments to President Biden’s 2021 Executive Order on Promoting Access to Voting, which the coalition describes as “a visionary EO that has the potential to make registration and voting more accessible for millions of Americans, including many communities historically excluded from the political process.”

“In it,” the report states, “President Biden directs federal agencies to ‘consider ways to expand citizens’ opportunities to register to vote and to obtain information about, and participate in, the electoral process.'”

“This report evaluates 10 federal agencies on their progress in meeting the goals of this important EO,” it explains, adding later, “We estimate that, if these agencies integrate a high-quality voter registration opportunity for the people they serve, as recommended in this report, they could collectively generate an additional 3.5 million voter registration applications per year.”

The government agencies selected for evaluation were chosen “based on their potential for promoting access to registration and voting for large populations, feasibility of voter registration in their agency context, and capability to reach marginalized communities in our political system.”

So, to be clear: A powerful progressive coalition is pushing government agencies acting under a presidential order to influence the outcome of our elections.

The agencies include the: Bureau of Prisons (BOP), Department of Education (ED), General Services Administration (GSA), Indian Health Service (IHS), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Department of the Interior (DOI), U.S. Marshals Service (USMS), Department of the Treasury, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

Because nothing says “democracy” like putting the weight of the current administration on the scales of a “fair” election.

Unfortunately for the Leadership Conference, those agencies just aren’t holding up their end of the deal.

“While a few agencies have made noteworthy progress, especially toward improving access to voter registration, most have either made minimal progress on their initial strong commitments or have left important opportunities on the table,” the report reveals.

“The good news is, it’s not too late,” it continued. “But agencies must act swiftly over the next several months. As President Biden himself said, ‘It is our duty to ensure that registering to vote and the act of voting be made simple and easy for all those eligible to do so.’ In order to meet that duty, most federal agencies must work quickly to do everything they can to make voter registration and voting more accessible to the millions of eligible voters that they interact with on a regular basis.”

According to the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA), the President’s EO is shrouded in “secrecy” and “deploys the full force and might of the federal government to do the work that should be reserved for political parties.”

The progress report, the FGA told Fox News Digital (FND), is troubling as it focuses “on only those agencies that historically interact with voters that favor the President’s political party.”

“There’s a distinct lack of transparency—frankly, secrecy—surrounding the Biden administration’s voter registration and mobilization efforts,” said Tarren Bragdon, FGA president and CEO. “FGA was forced to sue the Department of Justice to compel them to reveal their planning documents. After 18 months, they still haven’t provided the full details of their plans.”

“It begs the question: what exactly are they working so hard to hide?” Bragdon stated. “We intend to find out. And we intend to share that information with the American people.”

Three agencies, according to the progress report, are pulling their weight: the Department of the Interior, the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Department of the Treasury.

But the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), which promotes some resources for new citizens, needs to step up its game.

To the USCIS, the Leadership Conference writes, “This existing policy sets USCIS apart, and in some ways ahead, of other agencies who do not currently offer any voter registration opportunities. Yet, there is more USCIS can and should do.”

“USCIS’ strong positioning to lead on this has only increased as the agency has made significant reductions to the citizenship application backlog and as it increases naturalizations (with 855,000 naturalizations in Fiscal Year 2021 and 1,023,200 naturalizations in Fiscal Year 2022),” the coalition continued. “Critically, many of these new potential voters represent communities marginalized in the democratic process, including people with limited English proficiency, people of color, people with low incomes, young people, and others.”

The U.S. Treasury Department received a gold star for “making a concerted effort to promote voter registration access to the low-income clients of its voluntary tax preparation clinics, and sharing information about voter registration with millions of Americans through the taxpaying process.”

But the Department of Justice and U.S. Marshals service must do more to get eligible voters who are currently in pre-trial custody to vote.

While the U.S. Marshals Service was “making progress on renegotiating their contracts with state and private jail facilities to ensure eligible voters in federal pre-trial custody can exercise their voting rights, and … ensuring that new contracts include those requirements,” according to the report, it “has not committed to other effective activities, such as opening the door to polling places in its contracting facilities, and leveraging its contracts to ensure ballot access for all eligible voters, not just those in federal custody.”

Online, conservatives are sounding the alarm bells.

“This is what we need to be worried about people, not if Trump or DeSantis wins the nomination,” wrote one user on Twitter. “This needs to be stopped !!! This is a true threat to our democracy.”

Melissa Fine

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