This topic is not nearly as dear to my heart as reminding elected reps they can’t block people on social media they use to communicate public business, but it is a close second. We allow elected representatives in New Hampshire to give out and use any email address as their legislator contact. Reframed, every rep and senator can get an “official” government email address, but they don’t all use them, nor are they required. And while not all official email transmitted on the state’s system is subject to public scrutiny (public-right to-know-law), private email (Gmail. proton, yahoo, etc.), even when used for public business), with a few exceptions, cannot be commanded for scrutiny.
If someone wanted to hide public business – like some high-ranking members of Democrat executive branch administrations have been known to do (including entire email servers, Hillary!) – they could eschew the state email address to which they are entitled and do that business on an email system of their choosing.
I am not accusing anyone or everyone who insists on using a personal email address (for public business) of deliberate subterfuge; I am merely observing that government actors are known to engage in it and that this is an allowable means to that end. One that invites the kind of byzantine problems argued as justification for HB1002 – dubbed by opponents as the Right to Know or RTK tax.
Despite support from several otherwise excellent reps (as an aside) and even after amending, I still find that law offensive and believe it goes in the wrong direction.
Julie Smith spent a good bit of time pursuing answers to the question of access to legislator emails in parallel to the disposition of HB1002. You can read some of that here, including an explanation of what official emails are public and not.
I bring it up because we’ve had some movement on a separate vector in what appears to be the proper direction.
Citizen activists pursuing legislative emails have managed something of a win. An Oct. 11, 2024, Informal Resolution notes that “The 2024-25 new class of House and Senate Representatives will all be required to use an official government e-mail for all communications.”
informal-resolution-report-10.11.24The activist’s pursuit of details believed buried in Rep. Berry’s personal (used for legislative business) emails through a 91a right-to-know request is a separate matter that led to this informal resolution. I am not clear on the process moving forward, but this seems to be a done deal internally. “There has been a growing number of cases around the country with courts ruling that even cell phone records in some instances are public RTK.”
The resolution does not appear to have any internal teeth, but it doesn’t need them. Assuming it is a done deal, legislators who try to bypass or subvert the new email rules could be subject to private litigation. As our readers know, pursuing transparency through the judicial system is far from ideal.
I wonder if we should expect the next legislative session to include a bill tweaking the right-to-know law again to protect them and allow private email. There is also that hanging chad of mobile phone privacy when used for public business. Our reps don’t get paid much (which is good), but how much hassle is this, and does it deter people from running at some point?
The obvious solution is to use the legislative email address.
Interesting times.
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