Privacy advocates should lament our loss of privacy in voting history, while constitutionalists should celebrate the vindication of the first and fourteenth amendments. A recent case concluded in the Circuit Court for the City of Richmond, Know Campaign v. Rodrigues, is a cause for celebration of the constitution and lamentation of our privacy rights.
2009: Enter the Know Campaign
In 2009 a formerly unknown organization, called the Know Campaign, prepared to mail out personal voting history of friends and neighbors in an effort to encourage people to vote. Coverage here.
A major problem with their plan is that the information they sought to disclose could not have been obtained directly from the State Board of Elections as the Know Campaign was not allowed direct access to this information. The Know Campaign appears to have taken the safer route in 2009 and decided not to engage in direct mail campaigning.
Virginia Distributes Your Voting History (in part) to Recipients Outside the Government
So where does this information come from? Voting history, (whether you voted, but not who you voted for) is collected and maintained in databases held by the state board of elections. This information is then made available (for four years) to a select group of individuals and organizations so they can affect the political process. This select group able to obtain theses records under Va. Code § 24.2-406 is limited to “candidates, elected officials, or political party chairmen and to no one else.”
The information included in these lists consists of your name, the general elections and publicly run party primaries you participated in, and your address. This information is used by those three special categories of candidates, elected officials, and party chairman to identify likely voters, and make rough identifications of party affiliation based on primary vote participation.
2010: The General Assembly Acts (or rather fails to act), and the Know Campaign Identifies a Legal Strategy
According to the Virginia Pilot, the General Assembly tried to change Va. Code § 24.2-406 during the 2010 session and failed to do so. In the interim , the Know Campaign appears to have filed and nonsuited case No. CL09005389 in the Circuit Court for the City of Richmond (an explanation of what a nonsuit is and how it works (or does not work) requires far more than a two sentence explanation and will be reserved for another time).
The Know Campaign Executes its Legal Strategy
