Why West Virginia’s Secretary Of State Won’t Follow Biden’s ‘Illegal Directives’ Federalizing ElectionsMac Warner says he doesn’t want to put local elections officials in the middle of the ‘illegal’ Bidenbucks directives.
By: M.D. Kittle
April 22, 2024
The FederalistWest Virginia Secretary of State Mac Warner has put the Biden administration on notice: The Mountain State doesn’t intend to enforce their “unconstitutional orders.”
Warner and Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson are leading the pushback against Biden’s Executive Order 14019, which commands federal agencies to work with state and local governments to register voters and facilitate get-out-the-vote initiatives targeting left-leaning voters. Biden’s fiat directs “approved” third-party organizations to “partner” in the GOTV campaign. The effort is referred to as “Bidenbucks,” a nod to Zuckbucks, the piles of private donations that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg dropped on local election administration in 2020.
Critics contend the executive order is unconstitutional because Congress never appropriated federal funding for local voter registration, while federal bureaucrats are doing the election work that states — not the federal government — are authorized to do.
“What we’re trying to do is let the administration know we do not intend to follow their illegal directives,” Warner told The Federalist in an interview last week.
That begins with West Virginia not accepting registrations coming out of the Bidenbucks initiative, Warner said. The secretary cited Article 1 Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution, which gives states and their legislatures the authority to prescribe “Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives.”
He added that the county clerks are already concerned that the federalization of voter registration will increase their workload and create numerous duplicate registrations.
“Somebody might already be registered and then they go in for SNAP or another federal assistance program and they get registered again,” the Republican secretary of state said. “Now you have a double registration, and the clerks have to take time to go and sort it out.” ...
