Douglass Mackey found guilty of election interference
twitter.com
twitter.com
I tried to take this post down and to not have two on the same topic but the time window to do so had expired. Sorry for the confusion.
10 years in the slammer for that? Beyond absurd
They made a posts across multiple platforms, and conspired with others to spread the false message. There was a pretty clear goal of disenfranchisement.
- from the DOJ press release
The prosecution established the defendant’s intent to reduce the turnout of black voters “ For example, on November 1, 2016, in or around the same time that Mackey was sending tweets suggesting the importance of limiting “black turnout,””
That’s mens rea.
“Doesn’t count because no one fell for it” (as if that excuses it anyways…)
“Well actually 4900 people fell for it”
“ALL 4900 OF THOSE WERE JUST PEOPLE JOKING AND I KNOW THIS BECAUSE I PULLED IT OUT OF MY BUTT”
Though FYI he hasn't yet been sentenced; 10 years is the maximum he could get.
Lots of people are saying either "No evidence that any votes were lost" or "He obviously had mens rea." As far as I can tell, both of these statements are probably true. Sometimes in law, intent is enough to create a crime, and sometimes it isn't. For example, attempted murder is a crime, but attempted assault is not (although sometimes attempted _aggravated_ assault is). So, is it established that intent is sufficient for a crime in this particular case or not?
Note that when I say "no evidence" I mean that I don't think the government lawyers submitted any evidence (like a sworn statement by somebody who said that they got fooled and subsequently did not vote because they thought they already had) that anyone was deprived of a vote. I don't mean that there's no rational basis to believe that anyone was deprived.
https://twitter.com/mskristinawong/status/795999059987173377
"Mackey has been found guilty by a jury of his peers of attempting to deprive individuals from exercising their sacred right to vote for the candidate of their choice" - U.S. Attorney Breon Peace
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I just...cannot...understand.
If you tweet something incorrect about privacy laws, are you depriving people of their right to privacy?
If you tweet something incorrect about firearm laws, are you depriving people of their right to bear arms?
If you tweet something incorrect about religious laws, are you depriving people of their right to religious expression?
> “What Mackey allegedly did to interfere with this process – by soliciting voters to cast their ballots via text – amounted to nothing short of vote theft."
> Mackey conspired with others to use social media platforms, including Twitter, to disseminate fraudulent messages designed to encourage supporters of one of the presidential candidates (the “Candidate”) to “vote” via text message or social media, a legally invalid method of voting
He was convicted of US Code 18 Section 241 which describes 2 or more people conspiring to deprive victims of their constitutional rights.
Simply tweeting something that is false wouldn't count, and it seems that even intentionally tweeting misinformation wouldn't break this law unless you were conspiring with others to do it.
Okay, but it has to break some law. You can't be convicted of conspiracy if you're conspiring to do something which is legal. If you actually completed the act you and the other conspirators planned, and this act was not a crime, then your conspiracy can't be a crime either.
If you think you see a fire in a crowded building and you say something, even if there isn't a fire, it's way different than going into a building and causing chaos because you want to cause chaos
And https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35395239 (https://d2eehagpk5cl65.cloudfront.net/img/q60/uploads/2021/0...) is even more explicit about their intent to defraud.
Suppose I create a positive meme about a campaign, which obviously happens a lot. Is that still “impersonation”? I find what Mackey did really unsavory and gross but I’m not really understanding what the principle being applied here actually is. Are meme/jokes/absurdities about political campaigns not legal?
Anyway, they are both clearly designed to imply an affiliation with the campaign. It's one thing to state that you support X, it's another thing to claim that you are speaking for or represent them.
Are you not in support of, or not aware of contexts like medicine, commerce, elections being sensitive enough to have laws around false or fraudulent behavior?
I still don't understand what you don't understand. Twitter is supposed to be a free square for crime?
Fraud is a financial crime, and Mackey was not convicted of fraud.
[...] The ad stated: “Avoid the Line. Vote from Home,” “Text ‘Hillary’ to 59925,” and “Vote for Hillary and be a part of history.” The fine print at the bottom of the deceptive image stated: “Must be 18 or older to vote. One vote per person. Must be a legal citizen of the United States. Voting by text not available in Guam, Puerto Rico, Alaska or Hawaii. Paid for by Hillary For President 2016.” The tweet included the typed hashtag “#ImWithHer,” a slogan frequently used by Hillary Clinton. On or about and before Election Day 2016, at least 4,900 unique telephone numbers texted “Hillary” or some derivative to the 59925 text number, which had been used in multiple deceptive campaign images tweeted by Mackey and his co-conspirators.
Certainly, this was amusing to those involved in it, and the basic idea is defensible as a joke. But if you keep adding layer upon layer of detail to make your joke more plausible, while also demonstrating intent by making an electronic record of your conversations where you say that your goal is to get fewer people to vote, the excuse starts to wear thin.
Admittedly, the people who fell for this and were deceived into 'voting' by text or thinking that they were signing up for campaign messages may have been a bit stupid. But the whole point of putting advisories and disclaimers in the fine print is to provide people with a credible channel of information that's independent of the exhortation in an advertisement. It's like the difference between teasing someone for being naive and actively exploiting them.