Elon Musk’s super PAC awarded two $1 million prizes to registered voters in Michigan and Wisconsin on Thursday, after being warned by the Justice Department that the payments might be illegal.
Federal law makes it a crime for anyone who “pays or offers to pay or accepts payment either for registration to vote or for voting.”
Musk’s little lottery is shitting on the spirit of that law at best and is in violation of it at worst. AFAIK, that’s why the DOJ issued a warning rather than something legally stronger.
The SCOTUS only cares about that when it enables them to pull some serious bullshit out of their ass. Otherwise they’re strict textualists and will say “It WaS a PeTiTiOn, FulLy LeGal AnD cOoL!” So they’ll be sure to step in and stop any action from being taken.
The SCOTUS scabs you are referring to make up their own interpretation of the law. They never csre about the actual spirirt of the law any more than they care about precedent.
The problem is that the premise is a vote buying scheme.
To win the $1 million prize, people must sign a petition affirming their support for the rights to free speech and bear arms. However, the fine print on the super PAC’s website specifies that only registered voters in seven battleground states are eligible to sign the petition – which experts said is the crux of the potential illegality.
Must be registered to participate means some people will register so that they can participate.
But yet it is fully illegal in some states to provide water to folks waiting in line to vote because it “can be considered” as a method of “buying votes”. People can be standing in direct sun for 4+ hours with no coverage or protection from the elements.
It specifically requires that participants (who will inherently be pro-trump) be registered voters and was announced before the registration cut off date. It’s not exactly a leap to come to the conclusion that this is buying Republican voter registration.
And if there’s one thing we learned from the Cards Against Humanity thing, the information regarding registration is available to PACs. They can check up on you to make sure you really have registered.
And although the petition (as far as I know) doesn’t ask for your party designation, I know a lot of Democrats who would willingly sign a plesde to protect the first and second amendments. But, the PACs can get access to your registered party, too. And do you really want to be giving your name and address to a bunch of people who consider you the “enemy of the state”?
Still no, but legally it’s more of a gray area. As the timeline stands it makes a clear message of “I will give you a chance to win $1mil if you go register to vote”.
Legal Eagle did a great video on this (where he also acknowledged it likely applys to the cards against humanity “joke” too).
If you actually care about the law and aren’t just shilling for a fascist whose entire empire is built on daddy’s slave mines I recommend watching that. There is a lot more nuance but there is very much precedent against this kind of stuff… that likely won’t be acted on.
He’s incentivizing voter registration by making cash payments and a lottery contingent on being a registered voter. Adding a trivial requirement of signing a petition (a petition which doesn’t function as a petition since they aren’t publicly sharing the signatures) doesn’t change the fact that it’s illegally incentivizing registration. If I promise to pay anyone that votes for my candidate of choice and also sings I’m a little teapot for me, I haven’t sidestepped the law. Musk is doing the same thing, he’s just putting the petition requirement front and center in the hope that framing it that way will make people think it’s legal.
If it was a nonbinding pledge to vote or to register to vote, that would be different. There’d still be all the rules that govern lotteries which could cause legal issues, but it wouldn’t actually cross the line into paying people for being registered voters.
The money was for a petition, so I still dont see what the problem is unless its because hes using PAC money specifically.
Musk is a tool regardless and a Drumpf simp
Musk’s little lottery is shitting on the spirit of that law at best and is in violation of it at worst. AFAIK, that’s why the DOJ issued a warning rather than something legally stronger.
Limp dick DoJ wont do shit about it… Again
The SCOTUS only cares about that when it enables them to pull some serious bullshit out of their ass. Otherwise they’re strict textualists and will say “It WaS a PeTiTiOn, FulLy LeGal AnD cOoL!” So they’ll be sure to step in and stop any action from being taken.
The SCOTUS scabs you are referring to make up their own interpretation of the law. They never csre about the actual spirirt of the law any more than they care about precedent.
The problem is that the premise is a vote buying scheme.
Must be registered to participate means some people will register so that they can participate.
But yet it is fully illegal in some states to provide water to folks waiting in line to vote because it “can be considered” as a method of “buying votes”. People can be standing in direct sun for 4+ hours with no coverage or protection from the elements.
Welcome to America. Leave while you still can.
It specifically requires that participants (who will inherently be pro-trump) be registered voters and was announced before the registration cut off date. It’s not exactly a leap to come to the conclusion that this is buying Republican voter registration.
And if there’s one thing we learned from the Cards Against Humanity thing, the information regarding registration is available to PACs. They can check up on you to make sure you really have registered.
And although the petition (as far as I know) doesn’t ask for your party designation, I know a lot of Democrats who would willingly sign a plesde to protect the first and second amendments. But, the PACs can get access to your registered party, too. And do you really want to be giving your name and address to a bunch of people who consider you the “enemy of the state”?
Couldn’t they just mine that data anyway if they wanted to make a list of enemies of the state?
Would it have been fine if it’d been after the date?
I thought requiring being registered was itself a problem?
Still no, but legally it’s more of a gray area. As the timeline stands it makes a clear message of “I will give you a chance to win $1mil if you go register to vote”.
Intent is harder to prove but just as much a part of the US legal system as anything else. Everybody knows what he’s doing.
Iasip: “because of the implication”
Legal Eagle did a great video on this (where he also acknowledged it likely applys to the cards against humanity “joke” too).
If you actually care about the law and aren’t just shilling for a fascist whose entire empire is built on daddy’s slave mines I recommend watching that. There is a lot more nuance but there is very much precedent against this kind of stuff… that likely won’t be acted on.
The money was for you to be Registered to Vote and sign the petition. You can’t just sign the petition without being registered to vote.
He’s incentivizing voter registration by making cash payments and a lottery contingent on being a registered voter. Adding a trivial requirement of signing a petition (a petition which doesn’t function as a petition since they aren’t publicly sharing the signatures) doesn’t change the fact that it’s illegally incentivizing registration. If I promise to pay anyone that votes for my candidate of choice and also sings I’m a little teapot for me, I haven’t sidestepped the law. Musk is doing the same thing, he’s just putting the petition requirement front and center in the hope that framing it that way will make people think it’s legal.
If it was a nonbinding pledge to vote or to register to vote, that would be different. There’d still be all the rules that govern lotteries which could cause legal issues, but it wouldn’t actually cross the line into paying people for being registered voters.