An official-looking envelope arrived in the mail on Friday. It came from the Voter Participation Center — a shadowy left-wing group — and contained threatening language.
“Remember, who you vote for is private, but whether or not you voted is public record,” wrote VPC President Tom Lopach in the letter. “We’re sending this mailing to you and your neighbors to share who does and does not vote in an effort to promote election participation.”
The mailer was addressed to my wife. It included a chart with her name, our Michigan address, and her supposed voting record from 2016 to 2022. It placed her information alongside what it claims are voting records of our “neighbors,” though we live nowhere near the streets listed.
“We will be reviewing these records after the election to determine whether or not you joined your neighbors in voting,” Lopach wrote. “While we have hidden the name and street number of your neighbors to protect their privacy, these are their true voting records.”
The mailer falsely claimed my wife did not vote in 2020. The outside of the mailer bears a return address in Lansing on Allegan Street, the same street where the secretary of state’s office is located, in the Charles E. Chamberlain Federal Building. From the large VPC seal on the mailer to the Lansing address, it looks almost intentionally official.
The VPC and its “sister” group, the Center for Voter Information, have been sending out similarly misleading and threatening mailers across America, as The Federalist reported.
In Maryland, the state attorney general issued a cease and desist order on Thursday against both groups for intimidating voters with these mailers.
“Let me be clear: these unnerving letters are unacceptable, and Maryland voters should know that their decision to vote this Election Day is entirely theirs to make,” wrote Attorney General Anthony Brown.
The group had sent unsolicited absentee ballot applications to thousands of voters across America as of September, Project Veritas reported. That month, Rep. Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., demanded that the IRS investigate the group “for potentially violating federal tax rules for tax-exempt” groups.
In September, The Washington Free Beacon reported that the VPC was targeting its Facebook voter registration ads to likely liberal audiences, calibrating ads to avoid people with more typically conservative interests, like Duck Dynasty, John Wayne, and NASCAR.
Oregon officials warned residents in August to be careful about mailers from the VPC and CVI, as they planned to send 20,000 mailers to “five of Oregon’s largest counties,” The Oregonian reported.
The VPC is a nonprofit that launched in 2003 as “Women’s Voices Women Vote,” but it changed its name in 2011, according to InfluenceWatch. John Podesta, Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign chairman, helped found the group. Today, it targets likely Democrat voting blocs like single women, young people, minorities, and new citizens as part of the “Rising American Electorate” — or the “Emerging Democrat Majority.” The VPC and CVI have a history of mailing inaccurate voter registration forms.
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