DOJ Ends Two-Year Attempt to Conceal Names Behind Pence-Kobach Commission

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WASHINGTON – Today, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) released an unredacted email chain revealing that Charles J. Cooper, J. Christian Adams, and John Fund were involved in the conversations around the formation of the Pence-Kobach Commission, the partisan effort spearheaded by the White House to search for ways to validate President Trump’s debunked claims about widespread voter fraud. CLC took the Department of Justice (DOJ) to court to find out which officials were on the email chain, in addition to Hans von Spakovsky. After nearly two years of seeking to hide the names of individuals involved in an inflammatory email to then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions regarding the partisan nature of the Pence-Kobach Commission, DOJ finally relented after a district court opinion ordered disclosure of the email without the challenged redactions. 

Danielle Lang, co-director of voting rights and redistricting at CLC, released the following statement:

“Since unsubstantiated claims about noncitizen voting have continued to pervade popular discourse, we were committed to seeing this fight through to the end. By releasing this information to the public, we can better defend against voter suppression. We now know that after this email was sent, both Hans von Spakovsky and J. Christian Adams were rewarded for their extreme views with appointments to the Pence-Kobach Commission. The public is now left to wonder why the government fought so hard to conceal these names."

Learn more about the case CLC v. DOJ.