Behind The Public Curtain: ERIC’s 2 Hour 2011 Presentation to California Officials Disclosed

The Gateway Pundit is releasing the 123-minute presentation by representatives of ERIC/Pew to the State of California. It was a major attempt to convince California to join ERIC.

Recorded in August 2011, this meeting provides insight into the ERIC voter registration collaboration. It exposes the promises made and tactics used to convince the public and election officials. Now 12 years later, California still refuses to join ERIC.

2011 Pew/CA – Morning, Session #1 Video (See below)
Reasons to use ERIC, poll testing results, Q&A.

2011 Pew/CA – Afternoon, Session #5 Video (See below)
ERIC’s data methodology. Online registration justification

This 2011 meeting was an all-day conference recorded by the States now-defunct California Channel. This PDF meeting agenda shows the five sessions and topics. Only session #1 and #5 discussed ERIC. Those two videos are above. Seated in the audience and not visible are election officials from the various CA Counties, from the State, and a few guests. This PDF shows the 13 people Pew brought to the meeting. All but one are leftists. .

This TGP article mentions that ERIC/Pew hired two polling firms. Their extensive use of polls and focus groups should not be overlooked. The discussions about polling in the videos give you a sense ERIC was running the equivalent of a strategic political campaign. It was clearly important they know what best to say, and what not to say to election officials and the public. Most tiny non-profits looking to do good clean business just tell the truth. They don’t poll test for the best spin.

Many current election officials adopted their ERIC program. They weren’t involved in the original decision to join ERIC. They now have a chance to see the original presentations by ERIC. Additionally, election integrity groups can see what was pitched, and why. They can determine if claims made by ERIC ever came true in their State, or others. ERIC reps said “it reduces the perception of fraud”.

The below clip is Evan Goldberg, Chief Deputy SOS for CA in 2011. He asks David Becker “I thought I heard you say the more you explain (ERIC’s) data matching to people, the more concerned they became about privacy. Your decision was to just stop telling them about the data”. Goldberg calls them out for manipulating focus group results. Becker’s response is telling. He flails, never addresses the manipulation, or shows any remorse for doing it.

Pew Center On The States (PCOTS) was a temporary division of the Pew Charitable Trust. Their staff and vendors created Pew’s “Voter Modernization Project”. PCOTS held meetings like the above with election officials across the country. Their “Modernization Project” was presented as basically two parts. They desperately needed States to deploy online voter registration systems and move away from paper registration. They then wanted States to join the new ERIC program, or risk being left behind.

Roughly 75% of American citizens are registered to vote. Pew’s stated goal was to go after the 25% not yet registered. They used Canada’s 93% voter registration participation as the best model to follow, even though registration is mostly mandated. Back in 2011, Pew knew if they could land California on the ERIC system, many other States would soon follow. To date, California has refused to join ERIC. The Goldberg clip above appears to sum up California’s feelings about ERIC, and David Becker.

This 2-minute excerpt shows David Becker explain how the ERIC system, by default, will disproportionally find people of color, young people, and the economically disadvantaged who are not yet registered to vote. Becker is admitting this new ERIC system will target the key demographics of the Democrat Party. There are many other unbelievable comments.

Below are some comments made in the Session #1 video.

Time stamps are their starting point.

• 00:08:57 – The system we have now is prone to error.
• 00:15:49 – Only 75% of voters are captured in current system, Canada is better.
• 00:20:13 – We wanted to bring in experts to fix it, not a band-aid way, but comprehensive 21st century.
• 00:23:09 – The system needed to be accurate and reduce or eliminate invalid registrations.
• 00:24:36 – Reduces the opportunity and “perception” of fraud.
• 00:29:08 – Listing the states that needed to pass laws to share data with this system.
• 00:40:48 – One of the strongest reasons to talk how this would work is because it prevents fraud
• 00:45:23 – We learned it’s not productive with focus groups to tell them all 10 ERIC data sources.
• 00:46:30 – It will reduce opportunities for fraud as outdate records are removed or corrected
• 00:48:44 – Some of these arguments really work. We are showing you what is most convincing.
• 00:55:23 – If we give better tools to election officials, they’ll be able to clean up the rolls better.
• 01:02:13 – Data does not get used unless it’s absolutely necessary.
• 01:02:44 – Designed with people’s privacy from the beginning.

2011 Pew/CA – Morning, Session #1 Video (66 minutes; Reasons to use ERIC, poll testing results, Q&A)

2011 Pew/CA – Afternoon, Session #5 Video (57 minutes; ERIC’s data methodology. Online registration justification)

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