Brian A. McClendon is a former Vice President of Engineering at Google and creator of Google Earth. He is the Democratic nominee for Kansas Secretary of State.
Harvard Political Review: You have spent much of the last three decades working in tech, and you have never run for office. What motivated you to run for Secretary of State? Why now?
Brian A. McClendon: To understand why I ran for Secretary of State, you have to understand some of my history. I spent thirty years in tech and developed software and hardware to make people’s lives easier and solve problems. I am an engineer by training with an abiding passion for Kansas. I combined these elements when I made the Lawrence apartment I grew up in the center of Google Earth. I have built small startup companies and led teams of over 2,000 professionals as [a] vice-president [at] Google. I am committed to the use of data and accountability in decision-making, security, and problem-solving.
When I came home to Kansas, I saw a lot of things wrong with the way our Secretary of State had been operating. I realized that voter registration was a big problem here because of some of the laws that had been passed and some of the tools that had not been built. We ended up building a website called KSVotes.org and registered 23,000 Kansans [to vote] in the last year. This application is mobile-friendly and is driven by the basic idea that registering to vote should be as accessible for eligible voters as using Google Maps.
This is what the Secretary of State should be doing. If you look at the role of Secretary of State, it is not just voter registration, however. It is also business registration and publishing all of the information from inside the state government to the state website that we citizens are supposed to be able to access [easily]. None of this has been updated, and I see an opportunity to help the state with this problem. I do not think in partisan terms, but rather about the impact of government actions on the lives of Kansans.
HPR: About 70 percent of those [KSVotes.org] registrants were between the ages of 18 and 35. What message do you have for these young voters? Why should they turn out?
BAM: This is the most important election in our lifetime. The voice of 18 to 35-year-olds, unfortunately, has not been heard. Since these folks are going to live in this world much longer than me, I think it is important for them to shape the world as they see fit. You can make a difference. We should not be letting the 55 and older crowd decide the future of our planet. Now is the time. We want everyone to participate, no matter who you are voting for. Just vote.
HPR: A recent Hutchinson News story revealed that outgoing Secretary of State Kris Kobach and your opponent, State Representative Scott Schwab, appeared to mischaracterize the voter registration capabilities of the iKan and “Vote Kansas” apps. Can you elaborate on the need for a tech-savvy secretary of state in the 21st century?
BAM: What we saw with those two situations is not just that they do not have a tech background but that they do not even care about tech and the services that they are providing. They have not tested the services. They have not used the services. Even if you do not have a tech background and you are responsible for this service, you have to understand what you are providing. It is basic.
The fact that Kris Kobach could not even figure out what tools his own office was providing, and that Scott Schwab had not even checked to see if the features he mentioned as being in the app were actually there, shows that they are not just [not] tech-savvy; they are tech-ignorant. This is unacceptable for any official, let alone the Secretary of State.
HPR: What issues will you prioritize if elected?
BAM: First, we need to make voter registration and voting both easier and more efficient. People have already used KSVotes.org to get registered to vote and request advanced ballots in under five minutes. We also need to make the entire registration and voting process [better] understood so that people participate. I think we are going to see increased participation this year for multiple reasons.
In general, however, Kansas is statistically in the lower third to lower quarter of the country in terms of voter administration and participation. I think Kansas should be in the top ten. I will focus on getting us there.
After that, we need to look at transparency issues in government. We need to be publishing more information about what is going on in the state on our state website so that Kansas citizens can watch their government and make sure their tax dollars are being spent effectively.
Finally, I will focus on enhancing the business registration process. The Secretary of State’s website is the front door for business in Kansas. We have a great opportunity to help entrepreneurs figure out how to start their companies and make them more successful. One of the challenges for small companies is many of them fail not due to the business plan but due to mechanical issues. Education in this area could help reduce business failure.
Image Credit: Brian A. McClendon
This interview has been edited and condensed.