Conservative groups are systematically attempting to challenge the legitimacy of large numbers of voter registrations across the country before the presidential election.
The strategy is part of a wider effort raising questions about the integrity of this year's election as former President Donald Trump without evidence that his opponents are trying to cheat.
The voter roll tactics include mass door-knocking campaigns, using special software designed to identify voters whose eligibility could be challenged and . Some of those have been brought by the Republican National Committee, which hosts the GOP's national convention this coming week.
Several Republican secretaries of state are combing through voter lists , including in Ohio and Tennessee, or to comply with .
Those behind the reviews cast them as good government endeavors intended to help local election offices clean up the rolls. Voting rights groups and Democrats believe the effort aims to shake faith in the results of the 2024 election and lay the legal groundwork to challenge the results.
Here is a look at what's happening around voter roll challenges:
States already must maintain their rolls
鈥淪oles to the Rolls鈥� in Michigan, whose name echoes the 鈥淪ouls to the Polls鈥� get-out-the-vote efforts of Black churches, and Nevada's Pigpen Project are among state-level initiatives in which volunteers are trying to find flaws in state voter rolls.
Their findings can sound ominous: dead people or non-U.S. citizens registered, or people listed at addresses where they no longer live, suggesting the potential for double-voting. Conservative activists identify the suspect records, then deliver them to local or state election offices for possible removal.
Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, earlier this year told a suburban Detroit clerk to reinstate the registrations of about 1,000 people who had been removed through such an effort, after the purge was reported by The New York Times.
Amy Cohen, executive director of the National Association of State Election Directors, said information from member states suggests the efforts are happening nationwide. She said many of the challenges ignore or misunderstand the complexity and legal requirements around maintaining voter rolls.
The National Voter Registration Act already requires states to take steps to maintain accurate and current voter registration lists. Just because someone finds an outdated registration doesn鈥檛 mean election officials are unaware of it, Cohen said.
鈥淰oter registration lists are living, breathing databases,鈥� she said. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 part of the challenge, because people move and die and change their names and just exist every single day, and when you get a list, you鈥檙e purchasing a moment in time. Registration activities and voter registration list maintenance activities are happening on an ongoing basis.鈥�
The fight for voter data
Conservative groups behind the voter roll reviews have filed hundreds of public records requests across the country to . In almost a quarter of states, the disputes have landed in the courts. One of their goals is to create public databases for anyone to search and question whether certain voters should be allowed on a state's rolls.
The Public Interest Legal Foundation, led by conservative attorney , is behind challenges in Colorado, Hawaii, Michigan, Minnesota, South Carolina and Wisconsin. Mitchell is perhaps best known for participating in to 鈥渇ind鈥� the votes he needed to win the state in 2020. Arizona, California, Maryland and Pennsylvania face lawsuits by other groups.
In Georgia, an of the state's 40 largest counties found that more than 18,000 voters had been challenged over the past two years, even though local election offices had rejected most of them.
Many of the volunteer groups have received encouragement to mine the voter lists at workshops led by MyPillow CEO , a Trump ally and leading voice promoting election conspiracy theories. They also sometimes employ tools such as EagleAI Network, a data-matching software program developed for Mitchell's Election Integrity Network that creates voter lists from change-of-address forms, criminal justice records and property tax data.
The Public Interest Legal Foundation also sued the Electronic Registration Information Center, a voluntary system in which states share data to maintain accurate voter lists. Its lawsuit sought access to information the member states had agreed to keep private when they joined.
The foundation's president and general counsel, J. Christian Adams, who previously worked in the Justice Department鈥檚 Voting Section, said not a single eligible voter has been removed from the rolls as a result of his group's efforts. He called the movement鈥檚 critics paranoid.
鈥淔raud, I don鈥檛 care about," he said. 鈥淎ccuracy is what I care about.鈥� He said correct voter lists are especially important in states that mail ballots to every registration on their lists.
At least nine Republican-led states have abandoned the voluntary network, known as ERIC, after it became embroiled in , weakening its ability to cross-check voter records across state lines. Supporters of the system noted the paradox of the Republican states leaving because it's that helps states identify voters who are not eligible to cast a ballot.
Cleaning the rolls or sowing distrust?
The Republican National Committee, , also is involved in efforts to before the November election.
Michigan's voter rolls have been targeted in over the past four years by the RNC and others. A Nevada lawsuit filed by the RNC in March alleges the state is violating the National Voter Registration Act by failing to keep voter registration records accurate and updated. RNC Chair Michael Whatley at the time cited the need for 鈥渃lean voter rolls.鈥�
Experts say the federal law actually errs on the side of enfranchising voters. To prevent eligible voters from being disenrolled, it requires outdated records to remain in the system for some years after they're flagged as a potential concern. It's a technicality that can explain questions often raised by conservative groups, such as the number of voter registrations exceeding a jurisdiction's population.
It's like 鈥渃omparing apples to orangutans,鈥� Nevada's Democratic attorney general said in faulting the data RNC cited in its analysis. In its brief, the Democratic National Committee cast the RNC lawsuits as building ammunition for a 2024 election challenge.
鈥淭his lawsuit is little more than political theater, designed less to address any real (much less substantial) issue with Nevada鈥檚 voter registration lists, than to sow public distrust in the security and integrity of our electoral systems," the filing said. "It is no more than a continuation of Republicans鈥� 2020 efforts to undermine public confidence in our elections.鈥�
Casting suspicions on voting
Trump ally Ken Blackwell, who leads election efforts at the America First Policy Institute, has said legitimate voters 鈥渞un the risk of having their hard-won right to vote diluted by unlawfully cast ballots鈥� if voter roll glitches aren鈥檛 addressed.
However, election law experts say the problem that such efforts aim to fix 鈥� ineligible voters casting ballots 鈥� remains exceptionally rare.
鈥淲hy? Because it鈥檚 common sense that one person voting when they鈥檙e not eligible is not going to swing an election, and is going to expose himself to criminal penalties,鈥� said Alice Clapman, senior counsel with the Brennan Center for Justice鈥檚 democracy program. 鈥淪o, even if someone were inclined to do this, it鈥檚 very high risk and very low reward.鈥�
Clapman said the is eroding trust in election officials, who already , and is undermining faith in the 鈥減roud civic activity鈥� of voting.
鈥淲hat鈥檚 so insidious about it is voting used to be a unifying national activity,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t's now become this object of suspicion, and that鈥檚 really corrosive of our democracy.鈥�
Julie Carr Smyth, The Associated Press
