For Immediate Release
Contact: Molly Woon
[email protected]
July 30, 2020
PORTLAND — While Republicans across the nation have been quick to openly challenge President Trump’s disturbing tweet today that proposed moving the date of the November election, Oregon’s Republican nominee for Secretary of State, Kim Thatcher, has kept noticeably quiet. Thatcher, a Trump Delegate running for the office that oversees Oregon elections, has not shown any willingness to stand up to President Trump, who routinely spreads election misinformation, particularly on Oregon’s proud tradition of vote-by-mail.
In an early morning tweet, President’s Trump claimed the November election should be delayed because voting by mail would make it “inaccurate and fraudulent.” This clearly unconstitutional suggestion demonstrates not only an attack on our nation’s democracy, but is a particular insult to Oregonians, who have solely used vote-by-mail for more than two decades. While it remains unclear whether Trump Delegate Kim Thatcher will take a stand against the President’s campaign of misinformation, Thatcher’s opponent, State Senator Shemia Fagan, has made clear her position that Oregonians deserve to know that their next Secretary of State will stand up to protect their vote, regardless of party affiliation, race, gender, or ZIP code.
“If Kim Thatcher is so blindly loyal to Trump that she won’t even stand up for Oregon Voters and our proud tradition of vote-by-mail, clearly we can’t trust her to administer independent elections,” said K.C. Hanson, Chair of the Democratic Party of Oregon. “Thatcher needs to explain to Oregon voters how she could possibly operate with the independence that is demanded of the Secretary of State’s office when she won’t even stand up to blatantly false information about Oregon’s elections.”
Oregon’s elections have been administered exclusively by mail-in paper ballots for the last twenty years and Oregon experiences some of the highest voter participation in the nation. A state audit by the late Republican Secretary of State Dennis Richardson found that 99.998% of ballots submitted had no problems.
“This race comes down to a matchup between Fagan, a fighter who always stands up for what’s right, and Thatcher, who has a troubling history of spreading misinformation and questionable ethics, public opposition to voter expansion, and unquestioned loyalty to Donald Trump regardless of his actions,” said Hanson.
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