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Democrats Ignore Concerns Over Non-citizen Voting, Despite Thousands Found on Voter Rolls

Posted on Thursday, September 26, 2024
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by Outside Contributor
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Arguing that no further action is required, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D- N.Y., said “Current law is very clear: What is so complicated about the fact that only citizens, under the United States Constitution and federal law, are permitted to vote in federal elections?”

A sizeable number of Democrats have downplayed concerns over non-citizens voting, while more states find thousands of them registered to vote ahead of the November presidential election.

As Republicans have attempted to pass a bill through Congress ensuring that only U.S. citizens vote in federal elections, Democrats have pushed back, claiming that non-citizens are already prohibited from voting in U.S. elections. However, states have continued to find non-citizens on their voter rolls, and some who may have voted in federal elections, after being registered to vote through the motor vehicles department.

While non-citizens are prohibited from voting in federal, state, and most local elections, municipalities in California, Maryland, and Vermont, and Washington, D.C., allow non-citizens to vote in local elections.

Thousands of non-citizen voters have been discovered on voter rolls this year. Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Louisiana, North Dakota, and Ohio have all included language in their state constitutions that prohibits non-citizen voting.

Meanwhile, Iowa, Idaho, Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, and Wisconsin all have constitutional amendment ballot measures for voters to decide in the November general election whether non-citizens should be prohibited from voting in state elections.

In July, the House of Representatives passed the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, which would amend the 1993 National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) – also called the “motor voter” law – to make states require documentation of a person’s citizenship before registering to vote in federal elections and ensure states to remove non-citizens from their voter rolls.

Only five House Democrats voted in favor of the bill. The bill has sat in the Senate since July, without a referral to any committees.

House Republicans attempted to pass the SAVE Act again last week with a continuing resolution to fund the government and avoid a shutdown, but it failed with 14 Republicans voting against it. The SAVE Act was attached to the continuing resolution to help ensure its passage in the Senate.

new continuing resolution was unveiled by House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., on Sunday that doesn’t include the SAVE Act.

Earlier this month, Rep. Jennifer McClellan, D-Va., criticized Republicans pushing the SAVE Act, comparing it to poll taxes from the Jim Crow era, The Hill reported. She said the documents required to prove citizenship “just happen to be the ones that cost money.”

“I am not voting for a modern poll tax just so that they can say they’ve done something to keep noncitizen voters from doing something that is already illegal, punishable by up to five years in federal prison, and that there’s very little evidence [it’s] a widespread problem,” McClellan said.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., also came out against the combined SAVE Act and continuing resolution, according to The Hill.

“Current law is very clear: What is so complicated about the fact that only citizens, under the United States Constitution and federal law, are permitted to vote in federal elections?” Jeffries said.

Ahead of the SAVE Act’s passage in July, the Biden administration released a policy statement in opposition to the House bill.

“​​The Administration strongly opposes H.R. 8281, the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act. It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in Federal elections – it is a Federal crime punishable by prison and fines,” the White House wrote.

“The alleged justification for this bill is based on easily disproven falsehoods. Additionally, making a false claim of citizenship or unlawfully voting in an election is punishable by removal from the United States and a permanent bar to admission. States already have effective safeguards in place to verify voters’ eligibility and maintain the accuracy of voter rolls.”

Also before the July vote, the office of House Minority Whip Katherine Clark, D- Mass., whose duties include recommending how rank-and-file conference members should vote on bills, urged colleagues to “VOTE NO” on the SAVE Act.

“As we’ve seen a number of times this Congress, House Republicans continue to irresponsibly call into question the credibility of our elections,” the statement reads. “Despite numerous recounts, challenges in court, and deep-dives by conservative think-tanks, there has been zero evidence of the widespread fraud that this bill purports to target. It is already illegal under current law for non-citizens to register to vote or to vote in federal elections.”

While Democrats have pushed back on concerns of non-citizens voting, the Department of Justice has charged one for illegally voting in multiple elections.

Earlier this month, an illegal immigrant agreed to plead guilty to charges of having stolen a U.S. citizen’s identity to illegally vote in multiple U.S. elections and illegally obtain a passport, according to the Justice Department. That illegal immigrant registered to vote in Alabama in 2016 and voted in the 2016 and 2020 primary and general elections.

Meanwhile, several states have found thousands of non-citizens on their voter rolls.

Oregon

Oregon removed more than 1,200 voters this month from state voter rolls who were registered to vote without proof of U.S. citizenship due to errors made by the Motor Vehicles Department.

The Oregon Driver and Motor Vehicle Services Division and the Oregon Secretary of State identified 1,259 people in the state who were registered to vote without providing proof of citizenship due to an error between the DMV and the Elections Division of the Secretary of State’s office.

There were nine ineligible voters who had cast ballots.

The error occurred with Oregon’s automatic voter registration system. The DMV transfers customers’ data to the Secretary of State’s office’s Elections Division if they have provided proof of U.S. citizenship. Once the Elections Division receives the data, the customers are registered to vote.

Iowa

Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird (R) has charged a non-citizen with illegally voting in a July city council election.

The non-citizen, Jorge Oscar Sanchez-Vasquez, a 42-year-old from Marshalltown, was arrested Wednesday and charged with two counts of election misconduct, according to the attorney general’s office. He resides in the U.S. legally but is ineligible to vote.

Bird’s office announced Friday that Sanchez-Vasquez faces charges for registering to vote and illegally doing so on July 16 in a Marshalltown City Council special election.

Pennsylvania

J. Christian Adams, president of the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF), said on a Just the News special report with The Association of Mature American Citizens on Tuesday that non-citizens had been registered to vote in Pennsylvania for decades.

“Pennsylvania had been registering non-citizens, by admission – this wasn’t some conspiracy on the internet – and they admitted they had been registering non-citizens for 20 years at PennDOT, and it was a glitch, they called it,” Adams said.

In 2017, Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt, a Republican who was a Philadelphia city commissioner at the time, told a Pennsylvania Senate committee that there were over 100,000 matches of voter registration records to state driver’s license numbers with Immigration and Naturalization Service indicators.

The matches don’t mean that all of those people were registered to vote, but Schmidt argued: “We’re not talking about an insignificant number here. We’re talking about a potentially very significant number of thousands and tens of thousands.”

The Pennsylvania Department of State announced in September 2017 that records indicated 1,160 non-citizens since 1972 had requested their voter registrations be canceled.

California

Meanwhile, in California, PILF filed a federal lawsuit in February against the Alameda County Registrar of Voters for allegedly violating the NVRA by not disclosing records of foreign nationals registering to vote and voting for more than 20 years.

Non-citizens have been placed on voter rolls through motor vehicle departments by lying about their citizenship, Adams also alleged in the Tuesday special report.

“[W]e’ve collected over the years of the data on how non-citizens get in, and it’s largely by not telling the truth in the motor voter process. And it includes people here on green cards, people here legally,” Adams said.

However, sometimes, non-citizens still get on states’ voter rolls despite explaining their citizenship status.

“People get registered to vote when they tell, on their voter registration form, the election officials, that they are not a citizen,” Adams added.

“We have hundreds where they actually mark on the form, ‘hello, not a citizen,’ and they still get registered to vote,” he explained.

PILF obtained voter registration forms from New Jersey and San Diego County, Calif., that show non-citizens declared their lack of U.S. citizenship but were still registered to vote.

Lauren Bis, PILF director of Communications and Engagement, told Just the News in February that most of the non-citizen voters self-reported casting ballots, since they must do so when going through the naturalization process to become a U.S. citizen.

The second most common way for non-citizens to get onto voter rolls is third-party registration drives by nonprofits, Adams previously told the “Just the News, No Noise” TV show.

Arizona

Last week, Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes (D) said that nearly 98,000 voters were incorrectly registered in the state as providing proof of U.S. citizenship, even though in fact they had not done so.

Fontes explained that there was an error in state systems that labeled the roughly 98,000 voters as providing documented proof of U.S. citizenship, Votebeat reported. The Motor Vehicle Division provides the state’s voter registration system with driver’s license information, and the error occurred in that process. Affected voters had first obtained Arizona driver’s licenses before October 1996 and were issued duplicate replacements before registering to vote after 2004, Fontes said.

The error has occurred for about 20 years and over four administrations, he noted, and was discovered by a Maricopa County worker who found a registered voter who hadn’t provided proof of U.S. citizenship but was listed as a voter who could cast ballots in both federal and state elections. The voter had a green card but never cast a ballot, Fontes said.

The Arizona Supreme Court on Friday determined that the nearly 98,000 voters who had not proven their citizenship nonetheless may vote in the November elections.

Texas

Last month, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) announced that more than 1 million ineligible voters have been removed from voter rolls since 2021. Of those, more than 6,500 non-citizens were found, and about 1,930 of them have voted. The records of those 1,930 voters are in the process of being sent to the attorney general’s office from the secretary of state’s office for investigation.

Ohio

In May, Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose (R) directed all 88 counties to begin a removal process for non-citizens on Ohio’s voter rolls following a review by his office’s Public Integrity Division and Office of Data Analytics and Archives. The review analyzed data from the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles and found 137 voter registrations of non-citizens who had twice confirmed their lack of U.S. citizenship.

In August, LaRose directed county election officials Thursday to remove another 499 non-citizens registered to vote from the state’s voter rolls.

Illinois and elsewhere

According to a PILF report from May 2023, Chicago records show that 394 foreign nationals were removed from the city’s voter rolls since 2007, with 20 of them recorded as casting 85 ballots.

In April 2023, PILF reported that Maricopa County, Ariz., records showed that since 2015, 222 foreign nationals were removed from the county’s voter rolls, with nine of them recorded as casting 12 ballots across four federal elections. 

According to a February report by PILF, Pima County has removed 186 non-citizens from its voter rolls since 2021, with the majority of those registered to vote through third parties.

Of the 186 non-citizen voters in Pima County, seven cast ballots across two federal and local elections. A total of 120 of the records, or approximately 65%, “came from ‘political parties and group drives,’” according to the information given to PILF by Pima County. The county data didn’t include which third-party drives registered the non-citizens. 

The year with the greatest amount of non-citizen voter records created in Pima County was 2022 at 132. The midterm election year of 2022 also had the highest number of non-citizen voters who cast ballots in the county, which was six in total during the general election.

Another PILF report noted that ahead of the 2014 midterm elections, North Carolina found that 1,454 individuals on state voter rolls were not naturalized U.S. citizens. Of those, 89 registrants appeared at polling places, 24 of which were challenged, with 11 of the challenges sustained.

Natalia graduated from Regent University with Bachelor of Arts degrees in Communication Studies and Government.

Reprinted with permission from Just the News – By Natalia Mittelstadt

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of AMAC or AMAC Action.

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Rey
Rey
7 days ago

Democrat party leadership are frauds themselves don’t pay attention to what they say Watch what they do. Democrats know the country does not support their dirty politics so they turn to cheating. They know it the country knows it. Time to make them all accountable for their dirty actions. Kick them out of congress for starters.

W P TURPIN
W P TURPIN
6 days ago

I have concluded that you can no longer trust the federal government to defend citizens. Both parties are guilty as sin and continue to stand bold faced and lie to us! So much for transparency and integrity. And they say WE are the treaths to democracy!!!!

David Millikan
David Millikan
7 days ago

The Fascist democrats will give their Illegal Alien Terrorist Invasion Criminals everything at OUR expense with OUR Money and Sovereignty putting Americans last as they continue with their lies and corruption to stay in power and control.

Marie
Marie
7 days ago

Because Democrats again refused to protect our election from illegals, why can’t Congress make an emergency law that no citizenship will be given to those who participated in illegal voting and they will ultimately be deported after serving jail time. That will at least scare them not to vote. A section in their Drivers licenses must have a citizenship or non-citizenship status & when they finally completed the yrs. of residency etc., etc., and become a citizen, they have to take that document to the DMV to remove the non-citizen status check mark.. Simple, but cheating Democrats will never agree to this, we know because cheating is their only way they can win, and they have been doing it for years since 1876 in the controversial Presidential election they declared they won, but a special Electoral Commission audit found that the Republican candidate Rutherford B. Hayes was the real winner who then was declared our 19th President on 03/02/1877……Democrats has not changed since then. So sad.

JPop
JPop
6 days ago

Of course they don’t care. They Hate America and Americans, because we’re to smart for to swallow their lies. Americans want freedom…Democrats want to control our lives. Force us into planned communities and promise us the world. WE THE PEOPLE want to live our lives, shrink government….and to be left alone. WE THE PEOPLE welcome Immigrants with open arms. We just don’t want them walking freely across the border (not knowing where they are from, who they really are), or flown in in the dead of night (forced on us).

David Campbell
David Campbell
6 days ago

They are not ignoring the concerns. They are counting on them.

Susan
Susan
6 days ago

Democrats want illegals to vote because it gives them more power!

uncleferd
uncleferd
6 days ago

The Democrat Party represents mostly their own interests (other than client organizations, such as labor and teachers unions, or wealthy individual donors).
Those within the higher echelons of the Democrat Party only give a less-than-half-hearted pretense of caring about their own local Democrat voter constituencies.
Just take one look at the burnt-out, urban areas where they supported the “defund the police” movement, instead of showing leadership… at the behest of their billionaire donors.
The bottom line for voters is that nothing says you’re stupid like a Harris yard sign.

johnh
johnh
3 days ago

Both Democrats & Republicans both responsible that election laws are followed, so quit making this a party issue and fix it. That is why we have the Judicial Branch of government so that this is monitored.

Bruce
Bruce
4 days ago

They’ll do anything they can to prevent a secure election.

James DeBona
James DeBona
5 days ago

The Democrats downplay our concerns about election integrity and tell us things like; don’t worry, it’s already unlawful for illegals to vote in our national elections so we’re covered! It’s easy for them because they are the direct beneficiaries of any and all election fraud, period! They have absolutely ZERO INTEREST in fixing the many problems with election integrity because it helps to keep their sorry arses in power!
Remember, the Democrat Party is no longer your mom and dad’s Democrat Party! They have been usurped by the Communist left in whole, and now would love to scuttle not just this evil capitalist economy, but this nation in its entirety!
All people need to know right now is that for this party of socialists, Marxists and communists that are now deceptively using the (D) in front of their titles, the means most definitely justify their ends!

Summer Sands
Summer Sands
5 days ago

I’m sorry, but ILLEGAL ALIENS should not be given anything in this Country, including a driver’s license. Non-citizens, here legally, should have it prominently displayed on their driver’s license or ID card that they are NON-CITIZEN. Any NON-CITIZEN, legal or illegal, caught voting in any of our elections should be immediately arrested, fined, and jailed for the maximum sentence allowed by law. Once they’ve entered the jail, they should have ALL their vital information, including DNA, entered into a criminal database. After they serve their sentence and have paid their fines, they should be immediately deported, along with their entire family. If they get caught in our Country illegally again, they should be BLOCKED from ever coming into our Country legally. This should include any of their immediate family as well as anyone related to them by DNA. We need to up the ante on ILLEGAL ALIENS. Maybe, just maybe, if what they impacted their entire family, FOREVER, they would stop their BS. In my opinion, the only way to stop the nonsense is to make the consequences as severe as possible with NO exceptions.

JML
JML
5 days ago

Our country is in such chaos, plus we have to worry about WWIII is scary as hell!

Randall L. Beatty
Randall L. Beatty
6 days ago

Well the Dems will look the other way because if they give away everything for FREE what illegal would not vote for them its not there money they give away same for the media and these big money pack people for the Dems they do not care about the people of this country they gain from the corruption in government.

Richard Barnhart
Richard Barnhart
6 days ago

I’m in central Virginia. Checked in local registrar’s office and was told the the voters are vetted and the registrar ha access to been verified to check against SS#’s. Virginia does have and will conduct “provisional” procedures if a voter is challenged or not vetted.
There are several Latino names on the voters list!! If you are at a precinct and you see a questionable person voting you have a right to challenge the voter whom must be vetted by Governmental identification and given a provisional voting form and said vote must be vetted by the registrar office..It makes no difference who the voter is.

anna hubert
anna hubert
6 days ago

Noncitizens voting is their only chance of survival. If they were voting Republican they would be deported before they could take next breath.

fred smith
fred smith
6 days ago

The absolute only thing that matters to the left, ie demonicrats, is winning! It doesn’t matter to them how they win, legal or not, just that they win.

Robert Zuccaro
Robert Zuccaro
6 days ago

Register enough illegals as Republican and the Democrats will eliminate the filibuster to pass the SAVE Act all by themselves! Just do what they’ve done for decades: promise them pathways to citizenship, extra benefits, $25,000 for a home… then do NOTHING! Easy!

jack smith and his memo ; trump
medicare costs - stethoscope and money with medication
biden-harris administration on Medicare program
joe biden at the white house

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