What is Benson hiding? It must be something big.
The woman who was inexplicably named the dean of Wayne State Law school, without ever having litigated a single legal case, now finds herself named yet again as defendant.
This time, it’s the U.S. Department of Justice.
The Trump administration filed suit last month against Benson in her capacity as Michigan’s secretary of state after she refused to hand over complete and unredacted voter registration information to the feds, as required by law.
“I told them they can’t have it,” Benson said in a statement. “I’m required to follow the law. State and federal law include strict privacy protections that keep people’s personal data confidential and keep everyone safe from identity theft.”
Identity theft by the federal government? WTF? Benson claims to have written a book on election law, but clearly she doesn’t understand it.
Our reporting last year showed that 105% of Michigan adults were registered to vote, far out of line with the national average (Minnesota comes in a distant second at 80%). So in August, the DOJ asked Benson to provide the name of every active voter, their driver’s license number, and the last four digits of their social security numbers. (It should be pointed out that the federal government already has access to every citizen’s driver’s license and social security number.)
Even so, Benson refuses to provide the unredacted information to the DOJ—including the information for the supposed 17,000 registered voters in Michigan over the age of 100.
Benson hides behind her cockamamie privacy ruse in obvious violation of federal law.
Consider:
- Title III of the Civil Rights Act (1960) states that Benson must retain all election materials and produce them upon demand to the U.S. Attorney General.
- The National Voters Registration Act (1995) requires Benson to keep an accurate list of eligible voters and remove those who have died and those who have moved away in a timely manner.
- The Help America Vote Act (2003) requires that a state may NOT process a voter application without a driver’s license number or the last four digits of a social security number. For those with neither, a special number must be assigned to the voter. In the case of the Chinese national who voted in Ann Arbor, Benson’s office could not even provide that special number.
Then there is the matter of the Real ID Act, which requires Benson’s office to keep copies of all passports, birth certificates, and social security numbers—presented by people applying for real and enhanced IDs—and produce them to the federal government upon request.
As we have previously reported, Benson’s office does not generally archive that sensitive information and is now the subject of a federal audit because of it.
In the Real ID case, Benson again makes unconvincing claims of privacy protections.
Here’s what’s so suspicious in all this. Michigan participates in an organization known as the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), designed “to assist states in improving the accuracy of America’s voting rolls.”
And how does ERIC accomplish this? It creates a database of voters’ dates of birth, driver’s licenses, and social security numbers sent by Michigan and other participating states. ERIC is a private organization that lacks any enforcement authority.
So Benson farms out our private information to a private entity but screams “Privacy!” when the government comes to dig through her mess. She thumbs her nose at the DOJ and the Civil Rights Act. She tells election workers to ignore absentee signatures. She is held in contempt by the Michigan House for refusing to turn over the most basic election training manuals.
What Benson has is contempt for the people. And it shows in her ridiculous influencer videos where she dresses down in an Elmer Fudd ball cap, while holding an empty cup of coffee in a pathetic attempt to plug into the kitchen-table cross talk.
What we see in those videos is a privileged commissar disguised in the costume of a common housewife. It’s a card trick. A slight-of-hand. A deflection of something bigger going on.
What is it? I think we’re closer to finding out.
Charlie LeDuff is a reporter educated in public schools. Follow him on X @Charlieleduff.
