Jon Favreau and Melissa Melendez have little in common.
He's a former speechwriter for President Barack Obama and co-hosts the staunchly anti-Trump "Pod Save America." She's a Trump-supporting Republican Assemblymember.
But they found some common ground in 2020. Both helped spread falsehoods about California's primary election on Twitter.
We recently criticized Melendez for spreading a rumor that California is stripping voters of their rights. A fact check by The Sacramento Bee found that Melendez was "echoing inaccurate sentiments spread within conservative circles across the state that California elected officials are purposefully disenfranchising Republican voters by switching them to no party preference without consent."
After heated criticism, Melendez seemed to abandon her crusade against the nonexistent conspiracy. But Favreau inadvertently helped revive a version of it last week.
On Thursday, he shared these sentences with his 1.2 million Twitter followers:
"California is purging 5 million voters from the rolls" and "You can't vote in the California Democratic primary unless you're a registered Democrat."
Both claims, made in a tweet by Peter Miller, a researcher for the "Pod Save America" HBO show, are inaccurate. The state does remove inactive voters from the rolls _ including dead people, nonvoters and non-California residents _ but the lack of context gave a misimpression. In addition, non-Democrats can vote in the Democratic primary.
Miller's tweet, retweeted by Favreau, racked up over 400 shares and likes. Enter Sam Mahood, 29, the press secretary for California's secretary of state. He immediately rebutted Miller.
"Neither of these things are true," tweeted Mahood. "Please delete this tweet, it's just spreading misinformation."
Fighting misinformation has become a full-time job for Mahood.
"It's one of the biggest problems we face in our election in 2020," said Mahood. "Things are heightened because of the presidential primary."
Some of the confusion stems from the process by which "no party preference" voters can vote in party primaries. NPP voters must take the extra step of requesting party ballots. The state is making efforts to ensure NPP voters know how to do so.
And since the Republican Party has barred NPP voters from participating in its primary, anyone wishing to vote Republican must register as a Republican.
Some voters have expressed surprise at finding out they are registered as NPP, but there's zero evidence of malfeasance. These voters likely declined to designate a party preference when reregistering to vote and then forgot. The changes may also be due to clerical errors or other easily fixable mistakes.
Main point: California encourages all voters to participate in elections and you can even register to vote, or switch parties, on Election Day.
On Twitter, Miller tried to defend his claims but received fierce pushback from journalists, voting experts and state officials. He finally relented, deleting his tweet. This caused it to disappear from Favreau's influential page, but neither made immediate attempts to set the record straight.
In an interview, Favreau said he retweeted Miller then got on a plane to Iowa that didn't have WiFi. By the time he landed, Miller's tweet had been deleted.
"Clearly, Peter made a mistake," said Favreau.
Asked whether he should issue a correction, as a newspaper would, Favreau demurred. Shortly afterward, Miller tweeted a correction: "Yesterday I tweeted that CA was purging millions of voters ... CA SOS pointed out that it was misleading, so I deleted the tweet. Sorry about that!"
The muck up came during the launch of Vote Save America, a national effort to register and engage voters. It's a laudable program, but it will take more than voter registration links to protect election integrity in 2020. All of us must guard against misinformation, and anyone who spreads it should issue a public correction, as Miller finally did.
"If you're not sure about something, ask questions," said Mahood. "Elections people are here to help. If you're confused by something, don't jump to conspiracy theories."
All voters, regardless of political party, should heed this advice.
