money OnPolitics: Congress subpoenas mother-daughter duo behind Jan. 6 rally.
Happy Monday, OnPolitics readers!
In case you weren't in Richmond, Virginia, this weekend, here’s what you need to know about former President Barack Obama's push for Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe.
"Don't be sitting on the couch!" Obama told supporters Saturday at Virginia Commonwealth University that turnout in early voting and on Election Day is necessary for Democrats in Virginia and across the county.
Obama's message to Black voters: You need to get out and vote if Democrats are to win the governor's race in Virginia – not to mention key congressional races throughout the nation in 2022, which will determine control of Congress and the success or failure of the second half of Joe Biden's presidency.
Why does this race matter? The Virginia governor's race, coming less than one year into Biden's presidency, is being viewed by many as a referendum of the president's term so far, as Biden has struggled to push his ambitious domestic agenda through a Democratic-controlled but still fractious Congress.
It's Amy with today's top stories.
This mother-daughter duo planned the Jan. 6 rally. Now, Congress wants them to testify.
The morning after the 2020 presidential election, the mother-daughter duo of Amy and Kylie Jane Kremer formed a viral Facebook group urging "boots on the ground" to thwart an alleged effort to steal the election from Donald Trump.
Their efforts culminated in Washington on Jan. 6 when the Kremers’ Women for America First Save America rally became a prelude for the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
Now, the House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack has subpoenaed the Kremers to give sworn testimony in depositions on Friday. What they say could help Congress understand how much organizers knew about impending violence and who funded the group's post-election events that helped to amplify Trump's false claims of election fraud.
Who are Amy and Kylie Jane Kremer? Amy Kremer helped found the Tea Party movement over a decade ago. Kylie Jane Kremer is Amy’s daughter. She interned for her mother’s organization and helped with social media for the bus-touring group Tea Party Express. She was the ‘person in charge’ of the Jan. 6 rally
Together they run Women for America First, a dark money group that doesn’t have to disclose donors and can spend almost half of its money on politics. The group put on the Jan. 6 rally where Trump and his allies spoke.
What does Congress hope to find out? In conversations with five members of the House Select committee, lawmakers said they want to know about any premeditated plans for violence at the Capitol and how dark money flowed to pay for the rally and to encourage people to show up in Washington. The lawmakers declined to give specifics on what questions they planned to ask the Kremers.
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Dems consider changes to filibuster: After another failed vote to advance voting rights legislation last week, Democratic lawmakers are debating the merits changes in the filibuster rule that many in the party see as essential.
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A QAnon conspiracy theory about election fraud is becoming a pro-Trump push for traceable ballots
Pro-Trump contenders who maintain the 2020 presidential contest was "rigged" against the former president are shifting their focus to new election and ballot security measures anchored by online conspiracy theories.
One of the right's emerging favorites is traceable ballots, a combination of printed security paper and digital tracking that would allow a person to look up their ballots after being cast.
An "America First" coalition of secretaries of state candidates backed by former President Donald Trump are among those calling for election officials to adopt those traceable, watermarked ballots as a remedy to fraudulent or illegal voting – even in the absence of proof of widespread voter fraud.
A PIN for your ballot: Most states allow voters to track their mail-in or absentee ballot similar to a package delivery. That was one thing Democratic and Republican election officials touted to help build confidence in mail-in ballots as COVID-19 forced voting procedural changes last year.
But what deeply conservative candidates aligned with Trump want is different. They are calling for a system that allows individuals to ferret out their individual ballot after it is scanned to verify it was counted correctly.
Red flags: Charlie Booner, a spokesman for Move Texas, a voting rights advocacy group, said the potential of making people's private voting data public would be a red flag.
"The privacy and the secrecy of the ballot is critical," he said. "This is not something that is coming from elections experts or cybersecurity experts, who frankly are the people that we need to be turning towards in this moment."
Want to know what's happening with The Facebook Papers? Follow our coverage here. — Amy
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: The mother-daughter duo behind the Jan. 6 rally to testify before House
