Voters cast their ballots inside the Silver Spring Civic Building in Montgomery County in 2022, as election workers stand by to help. File photo by Emmett Gartner/Capital News Service
The Maryland attorney general’s office said Friday it will not pursue legal action against an election mailer company, just one day after it said the company had to stop sending letters that “threatened” Maryland voters and could violate state law.
The course reversal came after an attorney for the Voter Participation Center and the Center for Voter Information said claims in a cease-and-desist letter from the state were “simply false,” and after giving assurances that the centers had already stopped their mailings in Maryland.
That was enough to settle the issue, according to a statement Friday from the attorney general’s office.
“The CVI/VPC has assured the OAG (Office of Attorney General) that it will not publicize information that identifies particular voters and their voting histories, including a voter’s participation in the 2024 Presidential election,” the statement said.
“The organization also indicated that it has no plans for any further mailings in Maryland; however, it did inform our office that there are letters already in the mail stream that may not have been delivered before the cease-and-desist letter was sent and could still arrive in mailboxes over the coming days,” it said.
The nonprofit Voter Participation Center said the letters were meant to drive more voters to the polls, particularly unmarried women, people of color and young voters. It and its sister organization, the Center for Voter Information, said they have been sending out the get-out-the-vote letters for years.
The letters, called the Voting Report Card, started arriving in Maryland mailboxes this week, just days before the 2024 election. The report card lists the recipient’s name and address, and their voting history beginning with the 2016 general election. It also shows what it claims are neighbors’ voting records, though names and addresses are redacted.
State orders halt to mailings that left voters ‘intimidated, shocked and ill-at-ease’
State election officials said such voting records are public record.
But the letters then say the Voter Participation Center “will be reviewing these records after the election to determine whether or not you joined your neighbors in voting.”
The mailers created a stir among some voters, according to state officials.
Attorney General Anthony Brown wrote in the Thursday cease-and-desist letter that the mailers left some voters feeling “intimidated, threatened, shocked, and ill-at-ease,” and ordered the centers to stop sending mailers that reported voting records of Marylanders, or face legal action if they continued to do so.
Scott Thomas, the outside counsel for the centers, called it “troubling” Brown’s office would call the get-out-the-vote letters intimidating, saying there was nothing in the language that violates state or federal law.
“Your letter … relied on an ‘implication’ that VPC and CVI are planning to publicize information that identifies particular voters and their voting history,” Thomas wrote to Brown. “That is simply false. That is not something that VPC or CVI has ever done, or would do in the future. To conjecture otherwise is irresponsible.”
Thomas also said that the cease-and-desist letter erroneously tied the two centers to text messages sent to voters in other states that said, “We’ll be sharing a report after the election of those who didn’t vote.”
“Neither VPC nor CVI has sent text messages in Maryland, or elsewhere, during this General Election season,” Thomas’ letter said.
The attorney general’s office said it was “satisfied” with that response.
“The OAG is satisfied that the organization will not improperly contact voters following this election to report on their, or their neighbors’, voting records and the OAG has no plans to take any further legal action,” the Friday statement said.
“The Office of the Attorney General wants to assure Maryland voters that the choice to vote is every individual voter’s choice to make,” it said. “Maryland’s voters should feel free to make that choice on their own, free from any undue influence.”