Election Integrity Report U0814
Election Integrity Report U0814
Election Integrity Report U0814
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Judicial Watch, Inc. | 425 Third Street, SW, Suite 800 | Washington, DC 20024
Preface
Sincerely,
Thomas Fitton
President
Ample evidence suggests that there are continuing problems with inaccurate election rolls
and voter fraud resulting from inadequate voter identification and law enforcement. Despite
determined efforts by groups and candidates with vested interests in porous electoral
systems to ignore or downplay violations of election law, reliable reports of voter fraud are
widespread and more arise from each election. Since significant elements of the national
media and, sadly, many local enforcement authorities cooperate in a hear no evil, see
no evil strategy, cases of voter fraud have gone mostly unreported to the general public. But
in 2012 when Judicial Watch launched its Election Integrity Project, it brought the reality of
voter fraud forward in ways that the courts and even the media could not ignore.
Judicial Watch has achieved significant success in several states with a multi-pronged
investigative and legal approach to restoring the integrity of the electoral process by
researching, exposing and filing federal and state lawsuits to enforce provisions of the
National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) that were hitherto ignored and violated; and by
providing expert legal advice to state efforts to protect the integrity of their electoral process
through passage of commonsense voter ID and other election integrity laws.
A. Voter lists are poorly maintained at the state and local levels:
In 2012, the non-partisan Pew Charitable Trust released an astonishing report noting that
[a]pproximately 2.75 million people have active registrations in more than one state.
That same report observed that 24 million one of every eight active voter
registrations in the United States are no longer valid or are significantly inaccurate, and
that [m]ore than 1.8 million deceased individuals are listed as active voters.
In December 2013, Michigan Secretary of State Ruth Johnson asked her attorney general
to investigate 10 non-citizens who voted in Michigan elections.
Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted was able to confirm that at least 17 non-citizens voted
in Ohio in the 2012 presidential election.
A 2012 Philadelphia City Commissioner report on voter fraud confirmed that 19 non-
citizens were registered in the city, with at least 7 voting.
A Bosnian citizen was among those illegally registering and voting in Iowa.
In 2005, the Government Accountability Office found that perhaps 3 percent of 30,000
persons called for jury duty from voter registration rolls in a single U.S. district court
were not U.S. citizens.
This kind of fraud could have an effect. There are many close elections. For example,
Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted reported that, based upon a review of 110 recounts
conducted following the 2013 General Election on November 5th, 35 local races and
8 local issues were decided by one vote or through breaking a tie. And certainly most
Americans remember how the presidential election of 2000 was decided by just over 500
votes cast in Florida.
C. GOAL NUMBER ONE: Cleaning state voter rolls as required by Section 8 of the
National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA):
We have successfully pursued lawsuits that we initiated in 2012 and resolved in 2014
related to cleaning voter rolls to comply with the NVRA that will have a direct and
positive impact in 2014 and 2016, in:
i. Ohio
ii. Indiana
We have threatened NVRA lawsuits, and are working currently to avoid going to court by
obtaining settlement agreements in:
i. Colorado
iii. Iowa
We have made official inquiries of, and have ongoing NVRA investigations in:
i. Alabama
ii. California
iii. Illinois
iv. Kentucky
vi. Missouri
We have hired experts to examine the voter rolls of all states covered by the NVRA.
While the data is incomplete, we have learned that 226 U.S. counties have more
registered voters than voting-age population. And some had more registered voters
than the total population!
Because the U.S. Justice Department under Attorney General Eric Holder has shirked its
responsibilities to enforce election integrity measures required by the NVRA, Judicial
Watch is now the number one private government watchdog organization doing so.
D. GOAL NUMBER TWO: Supporting voter ID and other election integrity laws, and
defending them in court:
vi. Other voter ID cases which are almost certain to be filed in the coming months.
Counseling states regarding passage of voter ID and other election integrity laws. For
example, assisting Pennsylvania in redrafting and repassing its voter ID law.
Providing information in publications like The Wall Street Journal to the public in
order to counter the fire-hose of left-wing talking points and misinformation that are
disseminated regarding this issue. For example:
vii. The general public is typically unaware of the fact that voter fraud of every
ix. Voter ID regulations are wildly popular in this country and are the world standard.
A September 2013 poll by the Bipartisan Policy Center/USA Today found that
82% of those polled support voter ID, including 72% of black voters, 83% of
Hispanic voters, and 70% of Democrats.
Most nations have voter ID laws. Europeans in particular are mystified by our failure to
do so. It is a common sense measure, given all the other ID requirements we have.
Supporting Kansas in its efforts to require that a federal registration form demand proof
of citizenship from potential registrants. Kansas won that case but it is on appeal and we
have filed an amicus brief in support of this measure.
Supporting Florida in its efforts to challenge a bizarre 2-1 circuit court ruling that forbids
it from removing unlawfully registered voters even illegal aliens in the 90 days before
a federal election. We plan to participate by filing an amicus brief in support of the states
efforts to clean its voter lists.
F. OUR OPPOSITION:
Topping the list, sadly, is the United States Justice Department under Attorney
General Eric Holder. To wit:
At the same time, the U.S. Justice Department is ignoring its responsibilities
under Section 8 of the NVRA, which requires states to remove from the rolls
voters who have died or moved elsewhere.
The mainstream media, which gives all of the foregoing a free ride, reiterates their
talking points, and ignores our facts.
Summary
The evidence is clear that inaccurate voter rolls, inadequate voter ID, and lack of
enforcement of election laws are exacerbating the existing problems of voter fraud.
The U.S. Department of Justice under Eric Holder has not only abdicated its
responsibility to enforce the clean voter rolls provision of the NVRA, but is also actively
attempting to block states from enacting commonsense voter ID laws.
It has therefore fallen to Judicial Watch to take the lead in intiating legal actions to
enforce existing federal election law and to support states attempting to keep their
elections honest. The ongoing support of our members is clearly essential in this effort.
In January of 2014, Judicial Watch and True the Vote concluded their NVRA Section 8
lawsuit against the State of Ohio by entering into a settlement agreement with Secretary
of State Jon Husted. The agreement requires Ohio to take several annual or monthly list
maintenance steps through November of 2018.
Judicial Watch and True the Vote first notified Ohio that it was violating Section 8 of the National
Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA) by letter dated February 9, 2012. Judicial Watch
and True the Vote then filed their federal lawsuit in August of 2012 alleging Ohio was failing to
remove the names of dead voters and voters who moved from the voter registration rolls.
The Ohio NVRA litigation was very different from the Indiana NVRA litigation. Unlike
Indiana, Ohio made efforts to correct its violations and clean up its voter registration rolls
almost immediately after we notified it of the violations and the potential lawsuit in February
of 2012. This is partly due to the fact that the Ohio Secretary of State already had broad
powers to issue regulations and directives to ensure the voter rolls were cleaned up without
the need for additional enabling actions by the Ohio legislature.
Judicial Watch and True the Vote have publicly applauded Ohio Secretary of State Jon
Husted for taking steps to clean the voter rolls, and for entering into this historic settlement
agreement. The NVRA was passed in 1993, and yet our 2014 settlement was the first and
only time in 20 years that a U.S. State entered into a settlement agreement with private
litigants to resolve NVRA Section 8 violations. In addition, the role of Judicial Watch and
True the Votes actions in focusing Ohios attention on the issue of voter roll maintenance
cannot be overstated.
During the 18 months of litigation, Judicial Watch and True the Vote engaged in discovery
to collect evidence of Ohios past violations of NVRA Section 8, which included requesting
documents from Ohio and taking the depositions of certain Ohio election officials. During
the course of the litigation, we learned that Ohios voter registration rolls had fallen into
neglect under Secretary Husteds immediate predecessor, Jennifer Brunner.
To see how our actions influenced the state of Ohios efforts to clean up its voter registration
rolls, consider the timeline of events following our February 2012 notice of violation letter
and the August 2012 lawsuit. As illustrated below, most of the list maintenance actions Ohio
formalized in our settlement agreement started after we sent them our February 2012 letter,
and some of the actions were not implemented until 2013 or later:
l The first list maintenance term in the settlement agreement requires Ohio to access the
interstate system known as the State and Territorial Exchange of Vital Events (STEVE)
l Our settlement agreement also required Ohio to access another state system known as the
Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck program administered by the Kansas Secretary of
State to identify registered voters who move out-of-state for list maintenance purposes.
Again according to Damschroder, the first time Ohio used the Crosscheck program
for list maintenance was in January of 2013.
l The settlement also requires Ohio to use its Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) drivers
license database to automatically update its voter registration rolls whenever a voter
changes his address.
According to Terry Burton, the Director of the Board of Elections for Wood County
Ohio, the State of Ohio fist implemented this BMV system for the counties to use in
May of 2013. Notably, the NVRA specifically requires states to implement this list
maintenance action, but as Secretary Husted admitted, Ohio had failed to comply with
it for 20 years, until after we filed our lawsuit.
l The settlement also requires Ohio to allow voters to update their voter registration
address online when they move, so that voters can easily and quickly notify the state and
counties of inaccurate voter registration information.
l Under the settlement terms, Ohio must ensure that all county election officials are
conducting monthly checks for duplicate voter registrations using Ohios statewide voter
registration system, and must require counties to keep potential duplicate registrations to
a minimum.
l The settlement requires Ohio to coordinate with Ohio colleges and universities so that
students leaving college are reminded to update their voter registration addresses so
outdated information can be removed.
l Finally, under the settlement, Ohio counties must send voter confirmation mailings
once every year to all voters registered in the county who havent voted or updated their
registration in two years. These are usually called inactivity mailings, but in Ohio
they call them Supplemental Notices. These kind of address confirmation mailings
are separate from National Change of Address (NCOA) notices, which are address
confirmations sent to voters who notify the US Post Office they are moving (Ohio sends
NCOA mailings every two years).
According to Matt Damschroder, prior to settling its lawsuit with us Ohio was only
issuing Supplemental Notices to confirm addresses for inactive voters every two
years, instead of every year like the settlement now requires.
Indiana Litigation
In June 2014, after two years of litigation, Judicial Watch and True the Vote concluded their his-
toric June 2012 lawsuit against the State of Indiana to force them to remove the names of dead
people and people who have moved from the voter registration lists. After two years of litiga-
tion, Judicial Watch and True the Vote successfully forced major changes in the Hoosier state:
l Indianas Secretary of State Is Now in Charge. Nearly one year after we filed our
lawsuit, Indiana adopted two new state laws which completely overhauled its voter
list maintenance spending and decision-making procedures within the Indiana state
government, as well as adding several new required list maintenance tasks. Specifically,
as explained in detail in our most recent brief to the Court, Indiana failed to conduct
reasonable list maintenance efforts for years because the state delegated such authority
to two Election Division Co-Directors, who were perennially deadlocked over what
constituted reasonable list maintenance efforts. In 2013, after being sued by Plaintiffs
and losing their Motion to Dismiss this lawsuit, Indiana finally adopted the long overdue
legislative fix of allowing the Secretary of State to break deadlocks between the Election
Division Co-Directors concerning list maintenance actions.
l Indiana Spends Substantial Funds to Show it Is Serious About Voter List Maintenance.
Nearly two years after we filed our lawsuit, in May of 2014, Indiana Secretary of State
Connie Lawson finally exercised her new state law authority and implemented one of
the capstones of the new Indiana legislation by personally pushing forward with a $2.1
million effort to send address confirmation mailings to every Indiana registered voter to
remove outdated names from the voter rolls. Judicial Watch has long been advocating
for Indiana to take this step, most recently in our motion for summary judgment when
we explained that reasonable activities for Indiana under Section 8 of the National
Earlier in the lawsuit, federal Judge William T. Lawrence issued a precedent-setting decision
finding that Judicial Watch and True the Vote had established their initial case that Indiana
was violating the voter list maintenance requirements of the NVRA, and that Indianas
violations were injuring True the Vote and Judicial Watchs Indiana members. Now, with
Indiana officials finally demonstrating true compliance with Section 8 of the NVRA, Judicial
Watch and True the Vote moved to dismiss their lawsuit, concluding the litigation for
achieving our objectives.
By way of background, Judicial Watchs analysis of publicly available data for 2010 showed
that the number of people listed on voter registration rolls in 12 Indiana counties exceeded
100% of the total voting-age population in those counties, provoking Judicial Watch to bring
this lawsuit in 2012. It is fortunate we did, because Indianas voter rolls had only gotten
worse. Once the same data became publicly available for 2012, Judicial Watchs review
showed that, by that time, 16 Indiana counties now had more people on the voter rolls than
total voting-age adults living in those counties.
The injury to Judicial Watchs members registered to vote in Indiana was real. We heard
from dozens of members expressing their concerns and asking us to protect their voting
rights against Indianas neglect of federal law. As we explained in our response to Indianas
motion to dismiss, Indianas failure to clean its voter rolls was undermining Judicial Watchs
members confidence in the integrity of elections, making it less likely they would vote in
upcoming elections:
As the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized and the Court in McGuffage reiterated,
ensuring that voters have confidence in the integrity of elections is essential
to ensuring citizens continue to participate in American democracy When
no less than twelve counties in the State of Indiana have more persons who
are registered to vote than total voting age population, voter confidence in the
electoral process is undermined and voters are less motivated to participate in that
process. Defendants failure to satisfy their voter list maintenance obligations is
burdening Judicial Watch, Inc.s members right to vote by undermining members
confidence in the electoral process.
Similarly, we explained that True the Votes essential purposes and goals include obtaining and
analyzing voter registration rolls to improve their accuracy and currency. By failing to satisfy
their voter list maintenance obligations under Section 8 of the NVRA, Defendants are making it
difficult or impossible for True the Vote to fulfill one of its essential purposes or goals.
With regard to Defendant Judicial Watch, the Court finds that it has satisfied
this burden by alleging that its members who are registered to vote in Indiana
The Court added that if True the Votes ability to carry out its mission of cleaning up
voter registration rolls has been perceptibly impaired by the Defendants alleged statutory
violation, True the Vote has suffered injury.
This was a landmark ruling from the Indiana federal court. In the 20 years since Congress
enacted the NVRA, no private organization had ever successfully sued state government
officials to hold them liable for violations of Section 8. Now that this precedent has been set,
it will be easier for groups nationwide to bring Section 8 claims against states, knowing the
standards the federal courts will mostly likely apply.
During the two year course of the litigation, Judicial Watch and True the Vote discovered that
the voter list maintenance problems in Indiana were deep and systemic. To identify just a
few examples of evidence uncovered in our lawsuit:
l At times, the Indiana Election Division improperly discouraged local county officials
from conducting list maintenance. According to deposition testimony, a lawyer working
for the Indiana Election Division told a county election official that conducting public
records research into whether registered voters over 100 years old were deceased was
discriminatory against the elderly.
l According to deposition testimony from county officials, local Indiana county officials
indicated they could not keep the voter rolls clean on their own without the support and
leadership of the Indiana State Government in coordinating the activities of 91 counties
and 6 different state offices, and in identifying voters moving outside of Indiana support
the counties were not getting.
l According to deposition testimony from county officials, the State of Indiana prohibited
local county officials from removing deceased voters from the rolls even if they read a
voters obituary in the newspaper or attended a voters funeral.
l According to deposition testimony, the two Co-Directors of the Indiana Election Division
disagreed for years and were deadlocked about whether the state should undertake even
the most ordinary list maintenance activities, like obtaining the National Change of
Address Database from the U.S. Post Office or the Social Security Death Index from the
U.S. Social Security Administration to clean the voter rolls.
l Indiana Code Section 3-6-4.2-3 was revised to allow the Indiana Secretary of State to
break ties and decide matters whenever the Election Division Co-Directors are unable to
resolve a dispute between themselves regarding the Indiana Election Divisions budget,
expenditures, or contracts. This is a particularly critical change, since maintaining the
accuracy of voter registration lists containing millions of names requires states to spend
money on both database technology as well as traditional mailings and human analysis.
l Indiana Code Section 3-7-45-4 was revised to specify that county officials could remove
the names of deceased persons from the voter rolls after receiving a copy of an obituary,
notice of estate administration, or other notice of death published in a newspaper.
l Indiana Code Section 3-7-45-5 was revised to require the Indiana Department of Health
to obtain out-of-state citizen death information monthly from the State and Territorial
Exchange of Vital Events (STEVE) System and the Electronic
l Indiana Code Section 3-7-45-6.1 was revised to require Indiana to obtain the Social
Security Death Index (SSDI) on a monthly basis to remove voters who have died and to
provide deceased registered voters to counties each month, tasks to be performed by the
Secretary of State if the Co-Directors fail to do so.
l Indiana Code Section 3-7-38.2-16 was revised to provide that, if the Election Division
Co-Directors cant agree on hiring a vendor to conduct a statewide address confirmation
mailing to all Indiana voters, the secretary of state may enter into the contract without
the approval of the election division.
l Indiana Code Section 3-7-38.2-8 was revised to require Indiana to provide counties with
the names of voters who move each month so they can be removed from the rolls or
updated as appropriate.
l Indiana Code Section 3-7-38.2-5 was revised to require Indiana to use the U.S. Post
Offices National Change of Address (NCOA) Service to identify registered voters who
have moved, and to require Indiana to enter the Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck
l Finally, Indiana Code Section 3-7-38.2-18 was revised to stipulate that if the Co-
Directors do not perform any of the list maintenance activities identified in Chapter 38 of
the Indiana Code, then the secretary of state shall perform the duty.
As important as Indianas new state laws are, they only make a difference when the officials
tasked with executing and enforcing the laws do their duty and carry out their obligations.
Thats why Judicial Watch and True the Vote pressed on with their litigation until solid evidence
emerged that Indianas long history of violating NVRA Section 8 was finally starting to fade.
On May 21, 2014, Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson announced via a press
release that the $2.1 million postcard mailing to all registered voters in Indiana was now
underway. In the press release, Secretary Lawson confirmed that Indianas voter rolls
contained inaccurate and outdated information, confirming the need for this list maintenance
undertaking, stating:
Last year [in 2013], I worked with state budget writers to secure the funding
to update Indianas voter list, said Secretary of State Connie Lawson. It
is estimated that at least one in eight voter registrations contains inaccurate
information. Inaccurate voter information affects the integrity of our voting
process. It may deflate voter turnout statistics because those numbers are based on
total registered voters, which we know contain some outdated information.
Judicial Watch and True the Vote had previously explained to the Court that, when a
states voter rolls become as inaccurate and out of data as Indianas, a statewide address
confirmation mailing is not only reasonable, it is essential for compliance with federal law:
l What constitutes reasonable voter list maintenance [under the NVRA] is situational and
varies over time, depending on how accurate and current a states voter rolls are and what
technologies and list maintenance resources are available to the state.
l Both the poor condition of Indianas voter rolls, and the failure of Co-Directors Deckard
and King to institute any new list maintenance programs or activities upon learning
of these inaccuracies, are factors that render Indianas voter list maintenance efforts
unreasonable under industry standards applicable to election administration.
l The lack of NCOA, statewide, or county-wide mailings to registered voters is yet another
factor rendering Indianas list maintenance effort unreasonable under industry standards
applicable to election administration.
To address our lawsuit, Indianas General Assembly and Governor had to overhaul their
election code and restructure the Indiana governments election administration structure forever,
making the Secretary of State the decision-maker on list maintenance and replacing the broken
system of two perennially-deadlocked Election Directors. If this becomes the standard for
addressing Section 8 claims going forward, it is a significant Judicial Watch achievement.
As Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton explained, Judicial Watchs Election Integrity
Project is one of the most important the organization has ever initiated, and the results of this
lawsuit demonstrate why. According to Fitton, Were very pleased that Governor Pence
and the Indiana General Assembly saw fit to correct the broken system of bi-partisan election
administration in the State of Indiana following our lawsuit. Were even more pleased that
Secretary of State Lawson is using her new powers to finally clean the badly outdated Indiana
voter rolls by conducting a statewide address confirmation mailing. It is hard to imagine
a bigger victory for election integrity than the results we obtained for our members here in
Indiana.
Fitton continued: Everyone knows how important it is to remove the names of dead people
and people who have moved from the voter rolls, since leaving these outdated registrations
on the rolls leaves our elections wide open to fraud. But not every state wants to roll up
its sleeves and do the work necessary to keep their voter rolls accurate and up to date, even
though federal law requires them to do so. As long as any state is shirking its obligation to
guarantee elections are fair and honest for all Americans, Judicial Watch will continue to
stand guard to fight for its members interests.
Email: info@JudicialWatch.org
www.JudicialWatch.org
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