Ohio Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose ordered the Midwest state’s voter rolls to be purged Tuesday after finding that 137 people were registered to vote in the upcoming election despite not being U.S. citizens, Fox News reported.
The Ohio Public Integrity Division looked into data from the state’s Bureau of Motor Vehicles and found 137 non-citizens on the voter rolls even though they had twice confirmed they were not U.S. citizens. Ohio, which was won by former President Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020, “leans Trump” for the 2024 election, according to RealClearPolitics.
To help the state remove non-citizens from its voter rolls, LaRose’s office has also requested information on citizenship data from President Joe Biden’s Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration, along with federal district court records, which show who has been disqualified from jury duty due to not being a U.S. citizen.
“These individuals will receive at least two written notices from the Secretary of State’s office asking them to confirm their citizenship status or cancel their registration. Failure to respond to these notices will result in removal of the registration from the voter rolls by the county boards of elections,” LaRose told Fox News.
“It’s important to recognize that some of these registrations may be the result of an honest mistake,” LaRose added. “These may be well-meaning people trying to pursue the American dream, and communication barriers sometimes result in a registration form being submitted in error. We need to help them get that cleared up before an accidental registration becomes an illegal vote that could result in a felony conviction or even deportation.”
As the southern border crisis continues under Biden’s leadership, Republicans across the country have raised concerns about illegal immigrants potentially voting in local and federal elections. Some municipalities, such as Washington, D.C., allow non-citizens to vote in local elections, a statute that was challenged but kept in place after a federal judge threw out the lawsuit seeking to prevent non-citizens from casting ballots.
Last week, House Republicans introduced the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, which would require documentation proving U.S. citizenship from anyone who registers to vote in U.S. elections. Currently, under the 1993 Voter Registration Act, people are only required to fill out a form swearing they are U.S. citizens and are not required to provide documentation, USA Today reported.
House Speaker Mike Johnson said it’s hard to prove how many illegal immigrants are voting in federal elections, but he added that Americans know “intuitively” that it is happening.
“We all know, intuitively, that a lot of illegals are voting in federal elections. But it’s not been something that is easily provable. We don’t have that number,” he said.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) told The Daily Mail, “Without the verification measures in the SAVE Act, we’re basically asking people who are already breaking the law by coming to the US illegally to abide by the honor system. No way; American elections should belong to American citizens, period.”
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