Federal Court Upholds Most of Arizona’s Two New Election Integrity Laws Regarding Proof of Citizenship, Found No ‘Discriminatory Purpose’

Register to Vote

Both sides are calling a federal district court’s ruling a win, which upheld most of two new Arizona election integrity laws. On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton struck down parts of HB 2492, which requires proof of citizenship in order to register to vote, and HB 2243, which requires quarterly reporting of the number of Arizona voters who did not list their citizenship status.

State Senator Jake Hoffman (R-Queen Creek), the primary sponsor of both bills, expressed his disappointment to The Arizona Sun Times. “Bolton’s ruling is potentially the most intellectually dishonest, schizophrenic legal determination in the last half century. Bolton has shown a clear disdain for legislative authority, while simultaneously weaponizing the court against common sense. The idea that a person wouldn’t need to produce documentary proof of citizenship to vote in U.S. elections is lunacy. I can only hope that this case ultimately works its way to the U.S. Supreme Court where there still remains a semblance of sanity thanks to President Trump’s justices and the great Clarence Thomas.”

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Georgia Moves to Block Noncitizen Voting in State Constitution

Georgia’s top election official is pointing to the Biden administration’s failure to secure the southern border as a reason the state Legislature must act to prevent voting by foreign nationals in state elections. 

“With open borders, citizenship verification for voter registration is more important than ever,” Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, said Monday in a public statement. 

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Fulton County Election Issues: Ballot Counting, Voter Rolls, Challenges, Board Seats, Lawsuits

While Fulton County, Ga., initially missed a box of early voting ballots during tabulation of last Tuesday’s election results, the county has a history of election issues since at least 2020. Fulton County, which includes Atlanta and is the most populous Georgia county, has experienced issues with ballot counting, voter rolls, and lawsuits over elections.

On Tuesday, the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections (BRE) has acknowledged “some batches” of absentee in-person ballots were missed from the Nov. 7 elections, but later found during the recount.

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AFEC Warns Arizona Secretary of State ‘Snark Doesn’t Get the Job Done’ in Dispute Over Voter Rolls

The Arizona Free Enterprise Club (AFEC) warned Secretary of State Adrian Fontes (D) it will bring a federal lawsuit against him over his alleged failure to maintain accurate voter lists in Arizona. AFEC gave the state until November 6 to rectify these issues, or else the non-profit will launch a federal lawsuit against Fontes.

In a report stating there are more registered voters than residents, or an “abnormally high” number of registered voters, in 14 of Arizona’s 15 counties, AFEC said it sent its letter to Fontes on August 8, urging him to “take his job as Secretary of State seriously” or face legal action.

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Election Expert Gina Swoboda Discusses Arizona’s Problems with Voter Rolls

Gina Swoboda, executive director of the Voter Reference Foundation (VRF), which is headquartered in Phoenix, discussed election problems and what to do about them recently on the Jenny Beth Show. Jenny Beth Martin was an early leader in the Tea Party movement as co-founder of Tea Party Patriots. In this first part of a three-part series from the interview, Swoboda explained how VRF’s websites can be used to look through voter registrations and spot problems with the voter rolls. 

Swoboda, who is also a Vice Chairman of the Arizona Republican Party and previously worked for the secretary of state’s office, told Martin, “The entire security of the election depends upon that list being accurate.” 

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Georgia Works to Improve Voter Rolls as State Exposes Fulton County 2020 Election Audit Errors

As more issues arise from the 2020 presidential election in Fulton County, Georgia is taking steps to better secure its future elections through cleaning its voter rolls.

According to state investigators, the county’s audit of the most recent presidential election included multiple errors but the overall outcome of the audit did not change.

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Fulton County GOP Sues After Candidate to Election Board Who Questioned Voter Rolls Was Rejected

The Fulton County GOP is suing the county Board of Commissioners for rejecting its nominee to an elections board, alleging he was not appointed for having previously raised concerns about voter rolls.

Fulton’s Republican Party says county law requires the seven-member board to appoint party nominees to Fulton’s Board of Registration and Elections if they meet all the qualifications. And not appointing such a nominee the board is violating the law, according to the lawsuit. 

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Pennsylvania State Senators Propose Withdrawal from Multi-State Voter-Data System

Pennsylvania State Senators Cris Dush (R-Bellefonte) and Jarrett Coleman (R-Allentown) are preparing legislation to withdraw the commonwealth from the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC). 

Over two dozen states and the District of Columbia participate in the election data-sharing system which they use to identify errors in their voter rolls. But seven states — Alabama, Florida, Iowa, Ohio, Louisiana, Missouri and West Virginia — recently cancelled their membership in the program. 

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222 Noncitizens Ousted from Voter Rolls of Arizona’s Largest County

Maricopa County, Arizona, a lightning rod during recent elections, has removed 222 foreign nationals from the voter registration rolls over the past seven years, according to a new report from the Public Interest Legal Foundation, an election watchdog group. 

Nine of those 222 noncitizens cast 12 ballots across a total of four federal elections, the legal foundation says. 

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Commentary: The Unacceptable Cost of Open-Border Mission Creep

One of the pitfalls of political extremism is that a few bad foundational ideas beget a host of even worse ideas and results. Such is the case with our immigration crisis, as what began with faculty lounge bull sessions has become accepted government policy that now threatens America’s future.

The idea that America’s borders should be softened to the point that any noncitizen could enter the country on his own terms was always problematic. From that flawed logic has come an intricate web of problems that most in our government have no will, no courage, and no competence to repair.

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Commentary: Voter Rolls Are Essential to Victory in the Election Integrity Fight

Voter rolls are the most important election integrity documents. They tell election officials who is eligible to vote. The voter rolls also tell election officials where to send mail ballots, so it is even more important that they are accurate in states that automatically send registered voters mail ballots.

It is essential that states have accurate and up to date voter rolls. This includes removing individuals who moved, have died, and duplicate registrants. Many states across the country are failing to do this essential voter list maintenance that is required by federal law.

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Election Integrity Measures Advance in Pennsylvania

A trio of bills are working their way through the Legislature to enhance the security of election ballots and remove deceased residents from the voter rolls. 

The House State Government Committee met on Monday to vote on House Bill 34, House Bill 143, and House Bill 2484, advancing all three of them past first consideration. The bills will need to get through three considerations before a final vote can be held.

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Wisconsin Election Commission: Local Election Managers Don’t Have to Respond to Voter Roll Questions

People at a voting location, voting early at polls

Wisconsin’s election managers are telling local clerks that they may ignore questions about their voter rolls if they’d like.

The Wisconsin Elections Commission last week sent a letter to all 1,850 municipal clerks plus the city of Milwaukee’s Election Commission and Milwaukee County’s Election Commission explaining that they have discretion in responding to outside requests for voter registration information.

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Voter Reference Foundation’s Gina Swoboda: Clean Elections Depend on Clean Voter Rolls

Neil W. McCabe, the national political editor of The Star News Network, interviewed Gina Swoboda, the executive director of the Phoenix-based Voter Reference Foundation. The foundation, founded by Doug Truax, posts the voter rolls from the states, with the goal of having the rolls from all 50 states posted–consistent with the 1993 Motor Voter law.

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Complaint: 586 Duplicate Registrants on Minnesota Voter Rolls

An election integrity law firm has filed a complaint against Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon after discovering that nearly 600 duplicate registrants appear on state voter rolls.

With the assistance of the Upper Midwest Law Center (UMLC), the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF) has requested a hearing on the duplicate registrants at the Minnesota Office of Administrative Hearings in St. Paul.

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Judicial Watch Pushes Five States to Clean Voter Rolls, or Face Federal Lawsuits

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The watchdog group Judicial Watch has sent letters to election officials in 14 counties across five states notifying them of apparent violations of the 1993 National Voter Registration Act.

The law mandates that all states “conduct a general program that makes a reasonable effort to remove” from its voter rolls the names of ineligible voters who have either died or moved.

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Lawmaker Gears Up to Grill Pennsylvania Department of State on Voter-Registry Errors Uncovered by Democrat Auditor General

As Pennsylvania Senate Intergovernmental Operations Committee Majority Chair Cris Dush (R-Wellsboro) investigates recent elections, Democratic lawmakers against tightening election security must contend with a withering 2019 audit of Pennsylvania’s voter registry.

At his investigation’s initial hearing last Thursday, Dush announced his intention to hold the Department of State (DOS) accountable for the mismanagement identified in the audit by calling the department to testify at the committee’s next hearing to be scheduled soon. 

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Election Auditors Report Surplus of over 74K Mail-In Ballots, 4K Voters Registered After Deadline, 18K Voters Removed from Rolls Following Election

During the Arizona Senate hearing on the election audit in Maricopa County Thursday morning, audit officials reported discovery of issues such as ballot duplicates and surpluses, voter roll data, and machine security. The audit officials testifying were Senate Liaison Ken Bennett, Cyber Ninjas CEO Doug Logan, and digital security firm CyFIR founder Ben Cotton. Cyber Ninjas is conducting the audit.

The Arizona Sun Times checked the Arizona legislature website at 8 am MST. The website was down. All that was displayed was an error message that said service was unavailable. The website remained that way until sometime after the Senate hearing began. 

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‘Come Back to Haunt’: Pennsylvania Lawsuit Alleges 21,000 Dead People Still on Voter Rolls

Woman voting at booth

A legal group filed a lawsuit in Pennsylvania alleging that the state has tens of thousands of deceased people on its voter rolls and that there is evidence of voting activity among the deceased.

The Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF), which is not associated with President Donald Trump’s campaign, filed the lawsuit Thursday arguing that Pennsylvania has failed to maintain voter registration records in violation of federal and state law, according to a press release. PILF alleged that in an October analysis it found at least 21,000 apparently deceased citizens on the state’s voter rolls, according to the complaint.

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