Dr. Ted Bolema, Mackinac Center for Public Policy
Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson is calling on Michigan residents to report “misleading or inaccurate information regarding voting or elections” to her office. According to the secretary, “Voters have a responsibility to proactively seek out reliable sources of information and encourage productive and honest dialogue.”
Certain types of misinformation may raise legitimate election integrity concerns, particularly if they are aimed at intimidating people from voting. For example, Michigan has ongoing prosecutions of people accused of trying to deter others from voting by falsely claiming that their votes or voting registration information would be monitored by the police, given to debt collectors or used to track them. Michigan is also prosecuting alleged cases of fundraising fraud related to a ballot initiative and signature collection fraud.
Benson appears, however, to have something different in mind for her new anti-misinformation initiative, which could give her party an advantage in the upcoming election.
Benson’s announcement does not define or give examples of the types of misinformation that Michigan residents should report to her office. Instead, she directs people to three websites, Snopes.com, FactCheck.org, and PolitiFact, to check the accuracy of information. She must have immense trust in these outfits to outsource to them the responsibility of separating political fact from political fiction.
Benson says Snopes.com “investigates and debunks misinformation, conspiracy theories and hoaxes.” FactCheck.org “verifies accuracy of political speech, ads, debates, interviews and press releases, while PolitiFact “verifies accuracy of statements made by politicians.” Benson’s own description of the fact-checkers she chose focuses more on political content and not on frauds that may suppress voting or confuse voters about when or where to vote.
These three appointed fact-checker organizations are well known for their left-leaning bias. They routinely review subjective topics like political rhetoric and political satire, sometimes with the apparent intention of getting whole publications removed from internet platforms. As liberal journalist Ben Smith once wrote about these fact checkers, “At their worst, they’re doing opinion journalism under pseudo-scientific banners, something that’s really corrosive to actual journalism, which if it’s any good is about reported fact in the first place.”
With this announcement, Benson claims it is the duty of the Secretary of State’s office to provide a rebuttal, at taxpayer expense, whenever a liberal staffer at Snopes or Politifact disagrees with a statement by a political candidate. It is unclear why the Secretary of State believes such persons earned the official endorsement of the Michigan government to carry out this task.
These fact-checking organizations are not large operations, having a total of about 50 employees listed on their webpages. It seems a stretch to expect them to review all the potentially inaccurate information voters will hear this election season. They are also not based in Michigan and appear to have no expertise in state election law.
In a 1927 Supreme Court case, a member of the Communist Party in California was charged with teaching about communism — specifically, about organizing workers to overthrow the capitalist economy.
Justice Louis Brandeis defended her right to express her opinions about communism: “If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies . . . the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence.” More recently, in a 2012 case rejecting the prosecution of a man who lied about receiving military medals, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote, “The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true.”
Secretary of State Benson’s misinformation initiative appears to take the opposite approach. It would squash misinformation, at least that identified by left-leaning, fact-checking organizations. At this point, it is not clear what the Secretary of State plans to do with political statements these private organizations find objectionable. But using government resources to issue rebuttals to information that private third parties flag as misinformation will inevitably favor one political party over the other.
Assessing the accuracy of “political speech, ads, debates, interviews and press releases” is not the job of the State of Michigan. Correcting misinformation is better left to political parties and candidates running for office, who should respond with information they believe to be accurate.
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Ted Bolema is a senior fellow with the Mackinac Center and an antitrust and competition fellow with the Innovators Network Foundation.
Certain types of misinformation may raise legitimate election integrity concerns, particularly if they are aimed at intimidating people from voting. For example, Michigan has ongoing prosecutions of people accused of trying to deter others from voting by falsely claiming that their votes or voting registration information would be monitored by the police, given to debt collectors or used to track them. Michigan is also prosecuting alleged cases of fundraising fraud related to a ballot initiative and signature collection fraud.
Benson appears, however, to have something different in mind for her new anti-misinformation initiative, which could give her party an advantage in the upcoming election.
Benson’s announcement does not define or give examples of the types of misinformation that Michigan residents should report to her office. Instead, she directs people to three websites, Snopes.com, FactCheck.org, and PolitiFact, to check the accuracy of information. She must have immense trust in these outfits to outsource to them the responsibility of separating political fact from political fiction.
Benson says Snopes.com “investigates and debunks misinformation, conspiracy theories and hoaxes.” FactCheck.org “verifies accuracy of political speech, ads, debates, interviews and press releases, while PolitiFact “verifies accuracy of statements made by politicians.” Benson’s own description of the fact-checkers she chose focuses more on political content and not on frauds that may suppress voting or confuse voters about when or where to vote.
These three appointed fact-checker organizations are well known for their left-leaning bias. They routinely review subjective topics like political rhetoric and political satire, sometimes with the apparent intention of getting whole publications removed from internet platforms. As liberal journalist Ben Smith once wrote about these fact checkers, “At their worst, they’re doing opinion journalism under pseudo-scientific banners, something that’s really corrosive to actual journalism, which if it’s any good is about reported fact in the first place.”
With this announcement, Benson claims it is the duty of the Secretary of State’s office to provide a rebuttal, at taxpayer expense, whenever a liberal staffer at Snopes or Politifact disagrees with a statement by a political candidate. It is unclear why the Secretary of State believes such persons earned the official endorsement of the Michigan government to carry out this task.
These fact-checking organizations are not large operations, having a total of about 50 employees listed on their webpages. It seems a stretch to expect them to review all the potentially inaccurate information voters will hear this election season. They are also not based in Michigan and appear to have no expertise in state election law.
In a 1927 Supreme Court case, a member of the Communist Party in California was charged with teaching about communism — specifically, about organizing workers to overthrow the capitalist economy.
Justice Louis Brandeis defended her right to express her opinions about communism: “If there be time to expose through discussion the falsehood and fallacies . . . the remedy to be applied is more speech, not enforced silence.” More recently, in a 2012 case rejecting the prosecution of a man who lied about receiving military medals, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote, “The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true.”
Secretary of State Benson’s misinformation initiative appears to take the opposite approach. It would squash misinformation, at least that identified by left-leaning, fact-checking organizations. At this point, it is not clear what the Secretary of State plans to do with political statements these private organizations find objectionable. But using government resources to issue rebuttals to information that private third parties flag as misinformation will inevitably favor one political party over the other.
Assessing the accuracy of “political speech, ads, debates, interviews and press releases” is not the job of the State of Michigan. Correcting misinformation is better left to political parties and candidates running for office, who should respond with information they believe to be accurate.
—————
Ted Bolema is a senior fellow with the Mackinac Center and an antitrust and competition fellow with the Innovators Network Foundation.
