For Immediate Release
December 14, 2016
SCDP CHAIR CALLS FOR SC ELECTORS TO RECEIVE INTELLIGENCE BRIEFING ON RUSSIAN INTERFERENCE
Columbia, SC – South Carolina Democratic Party Chair Jaime Harrison released the following statement today calling for South Carolina’s nine members of the Electoral College to receive an intelligence briefing detailing the Russian government’s use of espionage to interfere in the U.S. presidential election:
“In Federalist No. 68, Alexander Hamilton wrote that the members of the Electoral College must be those ‘most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice.’ Hamilton was particularly worried about ‘the desire in foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils’ by ‘raising a creature of their own to the chief magistracy of the Union.’ Explaining the specific methods of by which this might be accomplished—methods that the Electoral College was designed to prevent—Hamilton worried that other groups of voters might be ‘tampered with beforehand.’
“The CIA has reportedly concluded that Russia engaged in espionage with the intent of tampering with voters so that they would favor Donald Trump, who has praised Russian President Vladimir Putin. It is therefore clear that for the electors to analyze, deliberate, and choose judiciously, they must be fully informed of all intelligence pertaining to Russian interference in our election. I call upon our intelligence agencies to provide this information to all 538 electors. If such information is not immediately forthcoming, I call upon South Carolina’s nine electors to withhold their votes in the Electoral College until it is provided. Failure to do so would be inconsistent with the Constitution.”
South Carolina’s electors are Glenn McCall of York County, Matt Moore of Lexington County, Terry Hardesty of Berkeley County, Jim Ulmer of Orangeburg County, Brenda Bedenbaugh of Saluda County, Bill Conley of Spartanburg County, Shery Smith of Sumter County, Moye Graham of Clarendon County, and Jerry Rovner of Georgetown County. They are scheduled to meet to cast their votes in the Electoral College on December 19.
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