President Biden’s administration is going to great lengths to keep the media, the public, and even congressional committees from finding out whether his so-called “voter access” executive order is being used to illegally recruit Democrat voters for November’s elections.
In this, the third in a three-part series of articles on the cover-up, CNSNews examines how the administration is working to keep conservative media in the dark about potentially partisan activities and misuse of federal funds allocated in Biden’s 2021 Executive Order 14019. The order requires all federal agencies to use government resources and federal funds, which critics have branded “Bidenbucks,” to promote “access to voting” by registering voters.
One tactic being used by the Biden Administration is to comply with Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests by the media, but redact the content of the documents it turns over to the point of rendering them meaningless. In one case, a government communication obtained by The Daily Signal was entirely blacked out, with the exception of the words “We look forward to working with you to.”
In another ploy to avoid transparency regarding the executive order’s execution, the administration has gone so far as to invoke presidential communications privilege, deliberative process privilege – and even attorney-client privilege.
Most often, however, the White House and federal agencies have simply ignored requests for comment, clarification or information when they’ve come from media like Fox News, The Washington Examiner, The Federalist or The Daily Signal.
Even when media investigations have turned up evidence that the Biden Administration is using the executive order to collude with far-left activist groups and focus registration efforts on predominately Democrat voter groups – such as Latinos, felons, and Welfare recipients – the administration has chosen to duck requests for comment.
In contrast, the liberal, legacy media have made no effort to scrutinize Biden’s “voter access” executive order and its potential partisan, political implementation and misuse of federal funds.
Whether at the Biden Administration’s behest or out of liberal bias, establishment media have chosen to turn a blind eye to the executive order since it was signed on March 7, 2021, except to praise it or regurgitate its text when it was first issued:
- ABC, CBS, and PBS News Hour appear to have avoided the topic altogether.
- MSNBC has barely mentioned the executive order, doing so only in its first year and then only to laud it as a measure to protect voter rights.
- CNN has posted a handful of articles, proclaiming the executive order a protection of voter rights against restrictive state voter verification requirements.
- The New York Times ran a guest essay in 2021 calling for the executive order to be expanded to enlist the IRS to recruit and register voters.
- NPR has mentioned the executive order only a couple of times, both to give voice to its supporters.
On June 12 of this year, House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil (R-Wis.) subpoenaed 15 Biden administration cabinet members in order to obtain details about their respective agencies’ execution of the executive order, after the agencies failed to reply to his committee’s requests for information.
In the past month since the subpoenas were issued, NPR, Politico, and Roll Call have all published stories framing the House investigation in terms of the liberal media’s stereotypical “Republicans pounce” narrative used to downplay Democrat scandals.
In the first two segments of this series, CNSNews examined how the Biden Administration has fought efforts by watchdog groups and members of Congress to gain information addressing their concerns about the executive order:
Part One - Biden Hiding Details of How His ‘Voter Access’ Executive Order Is Influencing the Election
Part Two - Biden Administration Obstructing Congressional Probes of His ‘Voter Access’ Executive Order
