Top Iowa Elections Official Slams Ted Cruz Campaign on Public Shaming Mailers

Following-up from earlier today, "Wow! Ted Cruz Campaign Threatens Iowa Voters With Public Shaming if They Don't Caucus on Monday!"

At Politico, "Top Iowa elections official slams Cruz mailer" (via Memeorandum):

The Republican secretary of state says 'voting violation' piece is 'not keeping in the spirit of the Iowa Caucuses.'

AMES, Iowa — Iowa’s top elections official condemned Ted Cruz’s campaign on Saturday for sending mailers to Iowa voters designed to look like official documents that accuse them of a “VOTING VIOLATION” for failure to turn out in past elections.

Republican Secretary of State Paul Pate said in a statement that Cruz’s mailers, which has the words “official public record” printed in red at the top, “misrepresents the role of my office, and worse, misrepresents Iowa election law.”

“There is no such thing as an election violation related to frequency of voting,” said Paul, who was elected statewide as a Republican in 2014. “Any insinuation or statement to the contrary is wrong and I believe it is not in keeping in the spirit of the Iowa Caucuses.”

The controversial Cruz mailers show the name of the person receiving the mail at the top and then give them a grade on an A to F scale. Below, it shows their neighbors and their voting scores. It then urges them to caucus next week and warns, “A follow-up notice may be issued following Monday’s caucuses.”

Political science studies have shown that such voter-shaming and peer-pressure techniques can be effective to motivate less likely voters. Past campaigns have sent such mail but they come at the risk of backlash from voters who feel their — and their neighbors’ privacy — has been compromised.

Cruz spokeswoman Catherine Frazier said Saturday that the piece was “a standard mailer that folks at the Iowa Republican Party and other get-out-the-vote groups have used to help motivate low-propensity voters.”

“We're going to do everything we can to turn these folks out,” she said. She did not immediately respond to comment about Pate’s criticism.

The Republican Party of Iowa did not immediately respond to requests about whether they had sent such mailers in the past...

Keep reading.

These shaming mailers have been used abundantly by the Democrats. I'm literally sorry for Ted Cruz on this. It makes him look desperate.