re: Obama- group moves to block Trump voting commission from collecting data

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United to Protect Democracy, which draws its name from a line in President Barack Obama’s farewell address that urged his supporters to pick up where he was leaving off, has already raised a $1.5 million operating budget, hired five staffers and has plans to double that in the coming months. They’ve incorporated as both a 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4), allowing them to operate as a nonprofit but participate in some forms of political advocacy as well.

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They’re also hoping to establish themselves as a base for government employees worried about ethics violations — up to and including becoming whistleblowers — and are hoping that their website, https://unitedtoprotectdemocracy.org/,can become a resource.

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Bassin was an associate White House counsel during the first three years of the Obama administration, spending much of his time working on ethics questions such as what’s known as the agency contact rule, meant to prevent politics and favoritism from influencing independent agencies

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Jesse Lee, who was Obama’s White House director of rapid response, is also on board as communications director and Caroline McKay, a former legal assistant in the White House Counsel’s office, is managing operations. But they’re also coming with a huge network of support from other Obama lawyers, as well as partner organizations like the Brennan Center.

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Bassin “has managed to gain the support of a lot of very serious people,” said Karen Dunn, another former associate White House counsel best known for helping run debate prep for Obama and Hillary Clinton, and called her former colleague the “perfect person for this particular organization at this particular moment.”

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