As Politico reports today, the Obama re-election campaign is gathering data on potential voters. Worse, as we’ve found, BarackObama.com, the campaign website, states that it shares personal information with some parties other than the consumer, including “vendors, consultants and other service providers or volunteers” as well as “candidates, organizations, groups or causes that we believe have similar political viewpoints, principles or objectives.”
With whom is the Obama campaign going to share this information? If the Obama administration’s prior ties to groups like Media Matters and the Center for American Progress are any indication, we can expect that shared information will result in a brand new rolodex for far-left organizations that do favors for the Obama administration. As anyone who works in marketing knows, access to consumer information is an enormous asset; if the Obama campaign can wield that information, handing it to allies, it certainly pays for liberal organizations to fall into line.
Obama’s campaign claims that they intend no violation of privacy. “This campaign has always and will continue to be an organization that respects and takes care to protect information that people share with us,” Katie Hogan, a spokeswoman for Obama for America, told Politico. “We go to great lengths to make sure that supporters have the ability to opt out of communication and contact from the campaign.”
Ironically, the Obama adminsitration is currently pushing online privacy protections for consumers. But they’re not concerned about the privacy of those who visit their website – they’re fine with handing over that information to allies.
This should be troubling to liberals who supposedly care about the right to privacy. Where’s their ire now? Unless we know how the Obama campaign is treating information it gathers – and to whom it’s giving that information – Americans should be extremely careful about communications with the Obama campaign.