The Utah Senate moved Tuesday toward preventing public release of email addresses supplied by people as they register to vote —Â and some senators also called for preventing the release of voters' birth dates.
It voted 27-0 to move SB18 to final consideration later. That bill would ban releasing voters' email addresses, said its sponsor, Sen. Margaret Dayton, R-Orem.
Sen. Ralph Okerlund, R-Monroe, was among several senators who asked that the measure go a step further to ban release of exact birth dates. He suggested public release instead of just the ages of voters, and not their birth dates. Several senators said they had constituents ask them also for that change.
Ron Mortensen, cofounder of CitizensForTaxFairness.org, also distributed a news release complaining that currently "if you want to vote, you will have to make your birth date a public record even if this increases your exposure to identity theft. If you won't do this, you cannot vote."
