Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Chair Matthew Birong]: All right. Good afternoon, everyone. It is June 16, House Government Operations and Military Affairs.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Wow, we're still here. Oh,

[Chair Matthew Birong]: no, it is here. Yes, it's on sixteenth. There's not a seventeenth. Anyway, focusing, we are taking a look at the Senate proposal of amendment on on h four seven four, and then speaking to deputy secretary of state. But first, I think I would like to start with senator Callamore as he is the shepherd of the bill, and it has just voted out of the senate, correct sir?

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: Indeed. Please join us. I'll turn it to the shepherd.

[Tim — Legislative Counsel]: Yeah. The shepherd. So,

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: for the record, senator Colomore from the Rutland District. And, again, my thanks to you here in this committee for your hard work on this bill. We did take it into, the senate corresponding committee and have a strike all amendment, which I'm sure you've looked at, hopefully. And the only change from that and what was in the senate calendar is the amendment that I was successful in putting into place earlier today. It look it's a two page amendment. It looks like it's really complicated and dense, but it isn't. All it does is I don't wanna say return to, but it makes current law still current by continuing the threshold for right in candidates to be 25% or 25 votes in the house and 50 in the senate. The bill as introduced would have doubled that and would, in essence, have made it the same as announced candidates, if you will. I'm assuming that the rationale once upon a time was writing candidates don't have the same length of time to be running out get getting signatures. They're, in many ways, circumstances, standing at the polls that day saying, hey. What you writing my name in? So that's why the the threshold was lower, I think. I don't know because it was in law when I came in. Anyway, that passed. I did have some questions on the floor with respect to the strike all bill. I think, for the most part, I answered them, and it passed almost unanimously. I believe there were two no votes out of the 30 of us. So it will be yours to deal with, hopefully, this afternoon. Again, I have no way of predicting the future, but I don't think we'll be here tomorrow. So we're hoping that you will be able to take it up today and send it on to the governor. And I'll be glad to answer any questions about the strike all bill that we came up with, but I understand from rumors around the building that the, threshold was gonna create some angst for some folks. So we were able this morning to, take care of that, I hope. And, the rest of it, I think, seems pretty simple. I will explain what I did. It became evident to me, at least, on May 30, that last day that we were here together for today, that the bill didn't have runway enough to get out this year. And I was dismayed at that. Say what you want about the process here and the procedures, but that's the way it seemed to land. So secrete the deputy secretary of state and the elections director and I, and the secretary of state, to be fair, huddled at one point that Friday, and we came up with the idea of I said to them, give me your absolute must have provisions in this now 40 page bill, and I'll go back and draft it with deletions so that we can get a vote out of a senate committee and then, hopefully, have the house concur. So you'll see a lot of deletions in the strike call. The ranked choice voting is gone. The electronic voting is gone. There's some other, campaign finance things that we tweaked a little bit. Doesn't mean any of that is dead. It just means for the moment, this year, today, that they're not in the bill. And, hopefully, because it is a time sensitive situation, we can can get it done.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Yeah. I mean, first and foremost, I want to thank you for working so diligently to get this bill moving. There's a lot of mechanical stuff in here, a lot of technical stuff in here that's been desired for a couple of years now. And I also want to thank you publicly on the record for being a great communicator and partner with this committee and myself on this process. So I just want to say that part out loud. So my first question for you is you said you had a couple of answers, put a piece to you while you're on the floor. What was the main curiosity point for members of your chamber?

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: It had to do with the write in situation. I think the two senators who were both from the Chittenden County, not the same area, but the same district, but both there had, concerns that we were not allowing enough flexibility for write in candidates. That was the one bite at the apple provision that, we left in the bill. And so the question arose and I I had to take a a recess because I hadn't really thought about it this way. If a write in candidate in a primary loses, can that candidate run again in the general election? And the answer is no. Because, again, the principle is you only get one time to do it. And if you're not successful, you gotta wait for two years and try it again. So just because it's a write in candidate doesn't make it any different than if it was a candidate from a a major party. So that was one of them. And to be fair, I I understood the point that maybe we are sort of, in some manner, restricting democracy in terms of being able to, to jump in a race, but I'm not sure I buy that a 100%. Again, if someone wants to run for office, as I think most people here did, you go and you file the consent form, and you run around and you say, hey. Would you sign my petition? And so there's a process for doing that. And I just think that's probably the way 99% of us do it. I understand there were people from other districts in mind that that did manage to get elected, as writing candidates, and that's okay too. And we did massage it to the point and, I I wanna thank, both Lauren and Sean for, great cooperation on this. We did massage it to the point I mean, at one time, we had it so that if you ran as a right hand candidate, even if you got more votes than the candidate who ran on either of the major parties, you wouldn't win. And that seemed like, woah. Wait a minute. That's that's not exactly the way. So we've we've massaged it to the point where there are four or five exemptions, if you will, if you will, that that allow people to count the ballots if certain things happen. If somebody dies the day before the election, that write in candidate will be counted. If they don't file by that 5PM Thursday, but, again, they receive enough votes to be considered a candidate, that those votes will be counted. And a lot of this was, based upon the fact that we were trying to relieve our clerks of undue kind of work. You know, some of them were two, three, 04:00 in the morning still counting, write ins. And now I think we've got it to the point where maybe not everybody happy, but at least everybody said, yeah. That's that kinda makes some sense. So those were the two issues. The the one bite at the apple and then the, the write in candidates. Okay. Thank you. I was just curious about that, because sometimes the Q

[Chair Matthew Birong]: and As, especially when we move bills this tightly together from chamber to chamber to Q and A's often mirror themselves. Any other questions for senator Cowell or from the table?

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: And I'll shoot it right back at you. I appreciate the kind words, but it's a team effort. I had four other senators who worked Of course. Most of the time pretty seamlessly on on builds. And, so it's great, and I enjoy coming up and seeing all of you fine folks too. You've you've done some great work this session. Don't kid yourself. Did some great stuff. So, hopefully, this will get to the floor today. And if there are any anticipated questions I can help you answer, I'd be glad to do that. My goal here is to hear it I don't know. You're right at one?

[Chair Matthew Birong]: We're not going back on the floor. Two. Two.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: Yeah. So we're on at 02:30. So good afternoon or good morning still. Oh,

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: ouch.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: My, the happiest time today was really the year that the bill passed the house and is on the way to the governor.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: That is I can't wait. I hope to report that information to you later today. Yeah. Anything from the committee for senator Kao? Nope. Alright. You are free and clear, sir.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: Okay. Thank you

[Chair Matthew Birong]: so much for your time. Yep.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: We have deputy secretary here, if

[Chair Matthew Birong]: you wouldn't mind joining us.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: Is it okay, Sean? Please.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Yes. I love a duet.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Do you like duets, Brett? No. Not today.

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: Because we're not actually gonna sing.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: No. You and Tony.

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: We're a little bit.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Yeah. We are so at a table chamber right now. Anyway, good to see you all.

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: For the record, Lauren Hibbert, deputy secretary of state.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Shannon Election's director of state's office.

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: We are delighted to be with you this afternoon, this afternoon, and to talk about the changes that the Senate made to H474. We did talk about the majority of the changes before your last adjournment. So I'm going to just run through them really quickly, what is stayed in the bill. The one bite of the candidacy one bite candidacy is in. This was not a major, policy objection for

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: the sec

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: policy objective for the Secretary of State, but it has stated in the bill. I understand it was a priority for here. The delivery of early voter absentee ballots, we, this committee cleaned up the definition of an overseas voter. Thank you for doing that. And now aligns with the federal definition. And that section, that is section seven on page two and three of draft 11.3, remained the same. It did not change in the Senate. Section eight, nine It's really quite a few sections. Eight, nine, ten, eleven, and twelve modifies the write in candidates, really streamlining the process. This has changed since it was in this committee. As Senator Kalimore spoke to, we created exemptions. We changed the deadline. So when it left this committee after the amendment, it was that a writing candidate needs to file by the close of business on election night. We modified it to 5PM on the Thursday before an election with a lot of options. First and foremost, if your name is on a ballot in a different party for the same race, meaning I'm running in the Republican Party for House, but I am a write in candidate in the Democratic primary for that same House seat, those write ins would be counted. So that's the first major exception and is in keeping expressly saying what the law has been. If there is a death or disqualification, those write in candidates are counted without any consent having to be filed. That is the Senator Sears scenario. And if the total number of votes exceeds the minimum number that the person on the ballot received, meaning I'm on the ballot and I only receive 1,000 votes, but the total of write ins is 1,500, then all the write ins would need to be counted. Because it's possible that a write in candidate would have won. So those are the major, exceptions. There is a process, particularly if it's a multidistrict race where clerks can open the ballot bags the day after the election with, permission and guidance from the secretary of state to counsel write in candidates, because it would not be clear on election night that there was more write ins than there were on the ballot to the town clerk. So those are the main things about write ins. I think we've done a really excellent job between our work here in this committee and the work in the Senate. I think that it really meets the needs of the town clerks, which I'm very thankful for, so thank you. And, I have kept in touch with the minority leader in this chamber. And I believe she's supportive with those changes. So that is a negotiated and, I think, well threaded needle. I'm happy to answer any questions about where that landed. I think that is probably, of the changes, the most significant and most complicated to explain.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Okay. No, thank you for that. Representative Ingle.

[Rep. Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Thank you. I just want to thank the deputy secretary for working with the minority leader and the rest of us on this. It was really important for you to get this bill passed, and it was really important for us to be on board with what was in it. So thank you. It's a team sport.

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: It's my pleasure, and it's been actually a great experience. So I agree. I'm very grateful to have done it. There were some changes in campaign finance, but not in Section thirteen and fourteen. Those remained the same, which is that every candidate must register, and you must disclose your treasurer. But you only have to start disclosing funds, expenditures, and contributions at 500. Sections fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, 17A through G, those are the big campaign finance sections. There were changes there. Most notably, when this bill left this committee and the House chamber, we were taking out the phrase independent expenditure only committee and modifying that. We heard from some folks, witnesses on the Senate side. We also did more work with the attorney general's office. We decided that it was best to keep that term independent expenditure only campaign. It is, a federal term. The Federal Elections Commission uses it. So there's a body of case law and federal definitions. But we really looked at how to close loopholes. And the one that we really were striving to change in all those sections that looks like a lot of changes was clarifying that an independent expenditure only committee, which means that you are acting not connected to a candidate, but you're working to influence a campaign or influence the outcome of a race for a candidate, you could be working alone. You could be one business. You could be one person individual. And you still would have to fall within that definition of independent expenditure campaigns. This was a loophole that the law was not clear because the word committee said two or more. And so that was confusing. So now, even though it's a little bit of a linguistic leap, the word committee can now be just one person because you're working towards something. And so with that loophole modified, if there was, let's say, something, a charter change that a major business disagreed with, and they didn't accept any contributions from anybody else, but they actively put out a ton of signs and radio ads opposing that charter change in that community, they would have to file as an independent expenditure only campaign. So trying to make all of this space more transparent, more clear, and making sure that even if you're acting alone, that you would have to file. Again, that threshold is now $500 PAX, parties, and independent expenditures, all set at $500 That was a change. Nuance, we talked about it with the attorney general's office. There was some interest on the senate side to make it even lower, but we won't need to make sure that we allow for independent, political activism. You know, we can't loop in people who are going and buying, signs and sharpies and, protesting. And that could be a couple $100, depending on how many people are doing that. But we did want to make sure that it was at a threshold where we weren't limiting anybody's speech. We just are requiring disclosure, and 500 was agreed upon.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Our daughter's Evans, raise your hand.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Thanks. Just to maybe oversimplify it, this section is just making sure that whatever it says, like political action committee or something like that, it also says independent Expenditure only campaign. Thank you. I'm going to struggle with that later, I guess.

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: Well, you can just say the independent expenditure campaign. So they're just side by side now so

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: that they're Yeah, so it's really

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: clear that all the requirements remain the same. That wasn't ambiguity. It was a gray space, and we had seen some issues there. And the key takeaway for your floor report is this increases transparency of spending in all political spaces. So that really was our goal. The audit of voter checklists and district boundaries remained exactly the same as it left your chamber and is in this bill. Strengthening and clarifying the definitions of voter fraud, I believe that was in the House version, and that did not change on the Senate side. The review period to examine petitions, it's the same and as it left this body, the nomination of JP's deadline is the same as when it left this committee. The guidance for opening ballots is the same. We again, remember, this was a you could open them thirty days, but we needed it to be forty five to streamline with the UACABA deadlines. And those fifteen days were confusing. The clarification that annual meeting does not fall under open meeting law is still there and was in your version. A piece that did change is Section 37. I think that changed

[Chair Matthew Birong]: That was on the

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: We wanted to clarify that the law around automatic voter registration through the DMV process, that you needed to either show proof of citizenship or attest to citizenship, we wanted to make that more clear in the law. It was there, but we wanted it to be more clear, clearly expressed. We also wanted to get folks E911 address from DMV. You know, DMV asks for your address, and they ask for it in a very variety of formats. Well, we want the E911 address to come into our system to automatically flow so that our clerks have it. That's the best for boundary clarifications and that audit of the voter checklist. Those are the changes. And that's the bill. It is a pared down bill. I want to say that we were asked what our priorities were. There were some pieces that we cared about that were left on the floor. But that's where we were. Notably, ranked choice voting and some of the local issues that we had talked about in this committee are not in this bill, but we look forward to supporting them in the next elections, though.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Questions from the table for friends from Secretary of State's office? I wanna thank the committee. Well, first of I wanna thank you folks for really helping pull this together over the last week and a half or so. This has been a lot of jumping jacks instead of you. Right? I know it's

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: been a strange and odd trip, but it's been a good trip.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Oh, god. True words. Anyway, but Rob Hooper of Burlington. I'd like to thank you

[Rep. Robert Hooper (Burlington)]: for continuing to include the fruit in the bill. Yes. Ranked choice voting, I think, to stand alone because it's more complicated than we think.

[Lauren Hibbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: I yeah. I think for ranked choice voting, you know, I think that it's possible that in '27, we'll have a standalone bill or it included an elections bill. Those are policy decisions. I'm not ready to forecast yet, but I suspect that that is an issue that's going to come up. There's quite a few people who very strongly believe in ranked choice voting. And there is compelling arguments, at least to me, that ranked choice voting does help with political rhetoric because people are competing to get not just someone's first choice, but their third choice and their fourth choice. And I think given the events of the weekend in Minnesota, I think we all can agree. We need to diminish political rhetoric and the divides. And so, I think it is a way to do that. We need bipartisanship and people to work together. But we'll see where that lands. Again, it will be in 'twenty seven.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Okay. Anything else for our friends from across the street? You. Thank you.

[Tim — Legislative Counsel]: Afternoon, committee members. For the record, my name is Tim My Home Legislative Counsel. I do have a few materials at your disposal. One is a version of h 74, the election, miscellaneous bill as it was just passed out of the senate and which will look very similar to, the last iteration, which was draft 11.3 that came from Seneca Vops with the one modification amendment, made to it that, senator Callimore spoke of having to do with those write in signature thresholds. And that has been highlighted to draw the eye to what is contrasted with the the person that left the house originally. You also have an overview, which is lengthy but much more succinct than the bill itself. And although it says it's to 11.3, it really is, again, pretty useful and captures all of what did change since he left the house. For reference, all the items that were all the text that has been highlighted here appears in green font for easy identification. See what again, what changed from left the house, what the senate did.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Now

[Tim — Legislative Counsel]: last time I was here, off to the outline, and really not much has changed aside from that one amendment that Senator Collabor just spoke about. What would be the best use of the committee's time as far as me answering any questions you may have?

[Chair Matthew Birong]: I mean, personally, I think we've all had a lot, good amount of time to review this stuff. We got the information that you provided us prior to this last instance of amendment out to everyone. So I think there's a degree of comfort within changes leading up. So. Redwater zones.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: I know that you've highlighted them here. I wrote them in green, but would it be okay if we just quickly went through? Because I think we've got an I have I'll speak for myself. Won't say we I have a firm, idea of what stayed in the bill, what, changed. But could you quickly go through all the parts that were deleted? Yes. Perfect. If you don't mind. Sorry. Please. Yeah. We

[Chair Matthew Birong]: have two. Two.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. I just we have two. Alright. Could you please go over them until That's one a 50 result

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: of this. Yeah.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Just like a quick run through of what was deleted. I know that you you sort of marched everywhere here, but I just wanna make sure we're clear.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: High level run through.

[Tim — Legislative Counsel]: Super high. Yeah. Yeah. So section one has been deleted. That had

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: to do

[Tim — Legislative Counsel]: with the ranked choice voting report. Sections two and three were actually, never left the house. They were deleted, and that had by, this chamber had to do with the failure of major political parties to nominate a candidate by primary. So that didn't see the senate. Let's see. Oh, sorry. Apologies. That's section six that and that had to do with the report on electronic ballot return. The failure of major political parties to nominate candidates, by primary, that indeed was removed by senate gov ops. Apologies for the confusion. Let's see. Section eight having to do with candidate demographic information has been removed. Section 19 prohibiting employment of interested parties to a recount committee has been removed. Section 24 having to do with the filing of certificate of organization for public affairs that has been removed. And then a series of sections having to do with local elections. So section 30 cannabis establishment vote, Australian ballot. 31, annual and special, municipal meetings at will municipal officers. Section 32, having to do with Australian ballot, so modifications. Section 33 having to do with fire districts and their voters. Section 34, vacancies and town offices. Section thirty five and thirty six having to do with the authority of constables. And thirty eight and thirty nine, which was a list of candidate names on ballots, Although that was introduced by the senate and then deleted by the senate.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: Much to do with you.

[Tim — Legislative Counsel]: That's it. Happy to go into much more detail. Good luck.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: No. Thank you. That was good. I just wanted to make sure we touched on everything that was in it when it left here and did not return. You.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Any other questions from the committee for Mr. Depp? Again, I got you at the table, sir. So I want to also thank you for your work on this. Yeah. This has been a complex evolution in this bill. These elections bills are always, you know, a lot of work, effort, and emotion, but I just wanted to recognize your professionalism and your efforts for this committee, and the body in general on this, as well as other items. So thank you, sir.

[Tim — Legislative Counsel]: Appreciate it.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: If that's it for Mr. Devil, you can excuse him from the table.

[Tim — Legislative Counsel]: Thank you very much.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: All right. Okay team. Open it up for discussion right now. You do have to take an internal position on this. So it would be a straw, but I want to give everybody a moment to speak to any pieces, parts, whatnot, or large items.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: I liked it when the way it was when it left here, but I understand that it's really important that we get some of this going right now. I fully supported the Secretary of State's office and glad we were able to compromise on the writing candidate stuff. It seems like we're in a good comfortable place Everybody, and that was super supportive of it.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Yes, I know I'm very happy that we got this thing off the wall in big.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Yeah, I was worried.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Rep God. And I'd just like to say I'm I'm a lot more comfortable with this bill now, way it is now. I agree with, that the rep Hooper that ranked choice voting should be more to the stand alone and forward to working toward that. But this bill right now, I think we're good. I think it's a lot better, and it it makes sure it it identifies a key concern with the voting district so that we don't have another instinct.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Mhmm. Yes. That was a big fat promise we made at that Bennington one process. Yes.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I I really like that we're gonna do everything we can to make sure that doesn't happen again. Yes, sir.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Representative Hoover, how are you? We are just doing committee discussion on, age four seven four before we strawed our, community physician on our proposals of amendment. No. Four fifty. Nope. Nope. Nope. That's the other one. Couple of digits, please. Close. I'm not saying I can talk about Bill levers always clustered at the end. Sounds like

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: smart people did good work.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Say your position on it.

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: That's my position. 474. Yeah.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: That's great. You said 454? Okay. Let's stay focused on the 4474. High on the prize. Okay. Anything else for any members? Okay. Okay. Well, I guess I'll pick the most. Alright. Barring no other questions, concerns, or discussion, I move that we find favorable. The bill is amended from the senate. Thumbs up to support. And that looks like, hey. You bet on this. Eleven zero zero. Damn, I'm late. Time. And I don't see why this committee would be called back down here for any reason. Article board she brought up. Yes. No, I just wanted to say on the record that we did a lot of good work this year, and I'm really proud of the stuff that we moved. I really enjoy working with this team. And so I just personally want

[Sen. Brian Collamore (Rutland District)]: to thank all of them.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: And thank you, Chair Byron. Very much appreciate it. Our

[Chair Matthew Birong]: little pirate ship.

[Rep. Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Awesome.

[Chair Matthew Birong]: Alright. With that, hopefully, this is a wrap for this this session. Fingers crossed. Yeah. Fingers crossed. Alright.