Madam secretary. Thank you for your time today. It's good to be here in the fight over election fraud. We've noticed *** pivot among some of your colleagues in this fight over election fraud detection. And I'm speaking about Eric, the electronic registration Information Center. This is *** group of states that share data to catch fraud to catch double voting people perhaps registered in multiple states. Some of your colleagues mostly conservative have pulled out of this group recently because of various concerns your state is in it. Why, you know, Eric is quite simply the only um way that we can ensure that our voter rolls are as accurate as possible. Look, we have porous borders across our states. We have people moving in, moving out all the time. Uh The best way to make sure that every state in the United States has accurate voter rolls is for us to share information about who has come into our state, who has left our state, who has died. Um And uh you know, I think it's *** shame that uh some states uh seem to be determined to undermine this very critical tool. Uh It, it diminishes uh the strength of it and the value of it. For those of us who remain in it, we will remain in it. Um Because right now it is the only tool that we have uh to help uh assess when people are moving out of state. Let's talk about another issue that has come up here at this conference of the National Association of Secretaries of State. We have talked before about misinformation and disinformation. But let's talk about this new frontier of disinformation, artificial intelligence. *** I deep fakes. Are you worried that artificial intelligence, deep fakes could mislead voters in your state? Absolutely. You know, it's ***, it's *** huge concern and I think one of the things that we are doing is really going out on the offensive in terms of engagement with Vermonters. We've hired an education and civic engagement coordinator. Uh We are going to conduct our first ever civic health index to get sort of *** baseline of what do Vermonters uh do in their communities? How are they connected to, uh you know, to the, the, the real information in their communities? And then where do we see gaps that we need to fill in? Um We will be out there creating civics curriculum for our school teachers uh so that kids when they graduate from high school in Vermont will have *** sort of *** basic understanding of how government works. Um so that they can be more critical thinkers. And so that they are not as vulnerable to some of this misinformation, you know, but *** I really takes it to *** new level. Um And I think that it's just gonna make our job harder as uh election officials and uh statewide leaders. Uh So I think we're just gonna have to, to, you know, work harder and, um and, and keep ahead of folks making sure that we put out the, you know, the, the right information. You're trying to make sure voters in your state don't get duped. Yes, want to make sure that they know what, you know what I'm saying, how I'm saying it and, and, and also have *** great deal of faith that when something comes out of our office, that it is truthful that it is accurate and that it is helpful information. Let's talk about another item of concern. The Brennan Center for Justice in April released survey results that found about one in five election workers 20%. So they plan to quit before the next presidential election. That's the equivalent to 1 to 2 election officials quitting per day since the 2020 presidential election. After unprecedented threats, disinformation, COVID, et cetera. Are you expecting higher than normal turnover of election workers in your state? Yeah, you know, we've seen *** slight uptick I think in, in the turnover. Um so far it hasn't really been out of proportion with uh with what many industries have seen in terms of people sort of rethinking working world and you know, what, what does work life balance look like for me. Um But I think that it's important for us to uh to be mindful of it to see what we can do to prevent burnout among our election workers. Uh And I think one of the most important things that we can do is to help give them, um more ready made information on how they can talk to their constituents. Um because at the local level, you know, the local elections administrators in Vermont, they don't have communications, people, they don't have ready made talking points, they don't know how to respond when somebody comes at them with some piece of elections, uh misinformation. Um And so I think we can do *** better job of keeping an eye on that for them and helping disseminate uh helpful information for them. One pagers, if you will to help them communicate with their constituents. Finally, what is your top priority as you prepare for the next statewide election? Well, at the moment, um I'm *** little distracted because Vermont is uh experiencing some unprecedented rainfall. We're gonna get between six inches and *** foot of rain uh in the state. So I've been monitoring *** lot of uh *** lot of work going on at home to make sure that uh the Capitol Complex and our building in particular are uh are secured and that all of our employees uh get home and are able to, um you know, set up remote work. You know, we, we've all had *** good immersion in how to do remote work effectively and how to continue to serve our constituents uh while we're working at home uh as we did during the pandemic, but we are having to rapidly mobilize that so little, little. Uh And in fact, let me if I could interrupt since this is going to our station in Vermont. Uh has there been any damage to your office's operations or employees? Anything you talk about that's new as of today. So, as of this morning, around 9 30 we sent all of our employees home. Um and then shortly thereafter, um statewide, the I think the governor sent the, the rest of uh state employees to work remotely and, you know, everybody was able to get out of the building and, and get home and, and set up and working remotely. Uh But there is expected to be about *** 19 ft surge of the river that comes right by our office. That's Winski River uh bank is 15 ft. They're predicting 19 ft it could go higher depending on how much rainfall we get. And so that does look like much of the capital complex could see some flooding. And so we're working closely with our buildings and general services and, you know, trying to make sure that we're protecting everything that we can. Is there any voter information records, data servers, anything at risk right now, we've been through this before. There's nothing of, of critical value or archival value that is kept below the second floor of our building. You know, plier is prone to flooding, uh particularly in the winter time with ice jams. And so, uh we know how to keep all of the important stuff uh up higher. So, uh now that all the employees are home and uh and we know that it, it's just gonna be what it is. Uh, you know, we, we, we feel fairly comfortable that we're gonna have some clean up, we have to do, but that all systems will continue to operate as normal madam secretary. Thank you so much for your time and good luck. Thank you, the storm. Thank you. I appreciate it.