The Real Growing Foreign Influence in Our Elections

RNLA Vice President for Communications Harmeet Dhillon wrote today in the Daily Caller about San Francisco's new policy of allowing non-citizens to vote in its School Board elections.  Ms. Dhillon explains that liberals see non-citizens as a powerful force to support their radical policies:

Why are noncitizens — legal and illegal — being invited to vote in the first place, in school board elections or, as in some other jurisdictions, other municipal elections? The reason is clear: Liberal politicians, devoid of ideas and with dwindling support among Americans, see a promising voter pool in foreign nationals who might be future citizens, and have decided to cut out the waiting time and just let people vote whether they meet established criteria or not. . . .

The School Board in San Francisco controls a massive bureaucracy with a huge budget, with enormous power and influence:

San Francisco politicians are trying to play this alarming development off as no big deal, “just” a school board election because after all, some of these children are born here and are citizens themselves (some, of course, are not) and why shouldn’t the parents have a say? — so the argument goes. But make no mistake – if Americans stand by and allow foreign citizens to control our schools, the next step will be foreign citizens voting for Mayor, District Attorney, Sheriff, Board of Supervisors, judges, and more — after all, they live here — why shouldn’t they have a say in local government? Note as well how carefully San Francisco politicians avoid making any distinction between legal and illegal immigrants – for such distinctions contradict the open-borders extremism of the left. 

Focusing on the San Francisco school board elections, the implications are alarming enough. San Francisco Unified School District is the seventh largest in the nation, educating some 55,000 students annually, and very demographically diverse, with 36.3 percent Asian, 26.5 percent Hispanic, 13.3 percent white, and 7.6 percent black students. The 136 total schools in the district employ 10,000 employees, and had a budget for the 2016-2017 school year of a whopping $823,841,337 — averaging $10,182 in unrestricted funds per student ($566,065,162), with an additional quarter billion dollars in restricted funds. Over this massive government machine reigns the seven-member, liberal, San Francisco Board of Education, responsible, in its own words, “for establishing educational goals and standards; approving curriculum; setting the district budget … confirming appointment of all personnel; and approving purchases of equipment, supplies, services, leases, renovation, construction, and union contracts.” The Board of Education also appoints the county superintendent of schools.

Ms. Dhillon concludes by pointing out the obvious fact about real foreign influence on our elections that is being completely ignored by the mainstream media:

If our apathetic citizens continue to turn out at barely 50 percent in off-year elections, the chances of motivated non-citizens having a substantial impact on the outcomes of entry-level political races such as Board of Education, will increase as both politicians and non-citizens see a path forward for real foreign influence in our elections, far more tangible and potent than the specter of Russian bots tweeting propaganda in a social media echo chamber. While we are distracted by such issues at the national level, on the ground, non-Americans are having a growing impact every day at the polls. The Russian bots aren’t voting on the billion-dollar school board governance – but foreign nationals surely are, and the movement is coming to a city near you.

The entire Op-Ed is well worth a read.  Ms. Dhillon will be speaking at the RNLA's National Election Law Seminar on August 3 and 4 in St. Louis, Missouri.  There is still time to register to hear Ms. Dhillon and many other expert speakers.

Democrats Oppose Necessary Citizenship Question on 2020 Census

The purpose of a census is for a nation to count and survey its population, as prescribed in the U.S. Constitution. It would seem obvious then that asking whether an individual is a citizen of said country would be an appropriate and necessary question. However, most Democrats and the left-leaning American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) do not value an accurate census. Prof. John Baker wrote in The Hill:

This past week the American Civil Liberties Union filed yet another desperate lawsuit challenging the secretary of Commerce’s decision to reinstate a citizenship question on the 2020 decennial census. The ACLU filed suit two months after the sanctuary state of California first asked the federal courts to prevent the 2020 census from asking who is and is not a citizen.

Many elected officials in California and other Democrat-led states, assisted by left-wing, legal groups, seem more concerned about advancing the interests of illegal aliens than those of U.S. citizens.

It has become abundantly clear the ACLU and other liberal politicians and organizations have little concern with protecting American citizens or ensuring fair, open, and honest elections. In fact, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra’s recent lawsuit proves the left’s opposition to a citizenship question in the census is primarily an attempt to undermine the value of American citizenship, by granting illegal immigrants equal status. Pew Research points out:

A lawsuit by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra contends that if the census undercounted immigrants, it would be an incomplete population count that violates its constitutional purpose, which is to divide up seats in the U.S. House of Representatives based on the total U.S. population. (Census numbers also are used to allocate billions of dollars in federal funds.) 

A proper census is critical in establishing fair, open, and honest elections. Without it, the already difficult job of election officials to conduct a legitimate election that includes only legal citizens participating becomes next to impossible. The Federation for American Immigration Reform reports:

There is evidence that both foreign nationals who are lawfully present in the United States and illegal aliens have voted in recent elections. During this election cycle, non-citizens have been discovered on voter registration rolls in both Virginia and Pennsylvania. And the Office of the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of New York recently announced that it charged a Canadian woman with making a false claim to citizenship after she registered and voted in more than 20 elections.

With non-citizens routinely voting illegally, this is becoming a critical issue for our nation; it is important that our states have the necessary information to ensure an honest election. For this reason, a number of states requested a citizenship question on the 2020 census. As Prof. Baker described in The Hill:

States including Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas have requested that the Census Bureau include a question regarding citizenship on the 2020 Census questionnaire. 

A reliable calculation of the citizen, voting-age population is needed in order for states to meet their obligations. The decennial census questionnaire is the constitutional vehicle for collecting that information.

One of the RNLA’s principal missions is to stand for fair, open, and honest elections. We will continue to highlight those issues that can and would corrupt our election process.

The RNLA’s National Election Law Seminar in St. Louis, Missouri on August 3rd and 4th is an annual, nationwide event where our members can learn more about the citizenship census question, election law and administration, and recent developments in this field, all while earning CLE credits. For more information, visit the event page here.

Non-Citizens Don’t Have to be Removed from Voting Rolls, Even If They Tell You

Houston's County Registrar Ann Harris Bennett has undertaken an incredible, unprecedented action:

Houston’s registrar says she’s under no obligation to remove non-citizens from her voter rolls under the National Voter Registration Act, testing the limits of how far states and localities can go in trying to thwart efforts to clean up their election lists. 

Ann Harris Bennett, registrar for Harris County in Texas, is battling to keep secret the names of non-citizens who signed up to vote and, in some cases, may have even cast ballots. In a federal court filing last week she said people can be removed for other reasons, but there is no requirement she erase names of people even after they tell her they aren’t citizens. [Emphasis added.]

We need to parse that last sentence briefly.  Registrar Bennett is saying that if non-citizens tell her they are not eligible to vote, she does not have to remove them from the voter rolls.  

 This is frightening on multiple levels:  

• There is no good reason for a person to be on the voter registration list if they tell you they cannot legally vote.  There are examples of "bad names" on the list, which could contribute to vote fraud.    
• Also, this action alone could seriously injure or damage those non-citizens' ability to become citizens.

In Philadelphia, it was uncovered that more than 100,000 noncitizens may be registered to vote.  However, unlike Houston, Philadelphia Election Commissioner Al Schmidt was concerned not just about the voter rolls, but also for the non-citizens:

Schmidt says those people should be contacted. Besides the issue of election integrity, he says registering to vote – even unintentionally – will derail an immigrant’s path to US citizenship.

Yet, Bennett does not want to remove non-citizens, even if they are trying to do the right thing and telling her they are not citizens.  This is very troubling and Ms. Bennett should resign for the sake of all involved, including the non-citizens. 

America’s “Worst“ Election Official is Finally Starting to Pay for Her Fraud and/or Incompetence

Broward County Election Official Brenda Snipes is finally starting to face the music for her years of admitted vote fraud and incompetence.  Ironically, it was for her efforts regarding a Democrat Primary for then DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman that she is beginning to face the music:

Broward Circuit Judge Raag Singhal issued an order Friday determining that Supervisor Brenda Snipes' office improperly discarded thousands of ballots cast two years ago in the Democratic primary race between Tim Canova and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz. In a ruling first reported by Politico, Singhal sided with Canova, who filed a lawsuit last year after he said Snipes ignored and then illegally obstructed his request to copy and inspect ballots.

Snipes was not only slapped down by a judge in a summary judgment, because of her fighting even after she admitted she broke the law, but the plaintiff will now receive attorneys’ fees.  

Snipes action in this case may or may not have helped the former Hillary-backing DNC Chair survive a strong challenge from a Sanders-supported challenger. 

What can be said is no one should trust Snipes to run an election.  In the 2016 general election alone Snipes had the following problems:

• She admitted that “non-citizens and felons have voted despite not being eligible — especially right before major elections when groups are actively registering new voters.”

• She alleged “engaged in ongoing violations of Florida law governing the canvassing of vote-by-mail ballots [absentee ballots]. [T]ens of thousands of vote-by-mail ballots in Broward County are being opened by your staff: (1) before they have been canvassed by the county canvassing board; and (2) without providing the public the opportunity to review or file a protest against the canvass of a ballot believed to be legally deficient.”

Under Snipes, voters are being disenfranchised by non-citizen and felons on the one hand.  On the other hand, she is destroying ballots and making it more difficult to review her actions.

Florida’s Secretary of State is sending an election expert to ensure all laws are followed.  It is about time; for who knows how many Ms. Snipes has disenfranchised through fraud or incompetence.   

Latest Voting Problem in Pennsylvania: 100,000 Noncitizens Registered to Vote

RNLA Southeastern Pennsylvania Chapter Leader Linda Kerns continues to uncover problems with elections in Pennsylvania.  Yesterday the Washington Times wrote an article entitled Lawsuit: 100,000 noncitizens registered to vote in Pennsylvania, which stated:

The 100,000 number cited in the lawsuit comes from testimony given by Philadelphia [Election] Commissioner Al Schmidt, who revealed the glitch in the state motor vehicle bureau’s systems that prompted noncitizens to register to vote.

In recent months Pennsylvania’s Secretary of State has resigned; Democrat election officials have been charged with voter intimidation; Philadelphia Congressman and  Democrat Ranking Member of the Committee on House Administration (a.k.a. the elections committee) Bob Brady announced he is retiring in light of an election scandal; and now this.  The article also cites examples of noncitizens voting including this one:

Yet another woman voted in 2008 and 2012, had her registration canceled in 2014 because she wasn’t a citizen, then reregistered and voted in 2016, according to documents filed in court. She was registered as a Democrat.

Pennsylvania voters deserve better.  Every non-citizen's vote cancels out the legal vote of a registered citizen voter.

[FYI, Linda Kerns and RNLA’s Southeastern Pennsylvania Chapter will be hosting a reception this Thursday night. Check out details here.]

More Non-Citizens May Be Registered to Vote in Pennsylvania Than Initial Reports Indicated

The latest from the non-citizen voter registration problems in Pennsylvania is that the problem could be much larger than initially thought.  Back in September, Philadelphia City Commissioner Al Schmidt reported that 220 non-citizens registered to vote in Philadelphia through a "glitch" at the DMV that allowed persons to register to vote after they had proven that they were non-citizens.  41% had voted at least once.

Then in October, Pennsylvania's Democratic Secretary of State, Pedro Cortes, resigned abruptly and with no explanation.  No official explanation has been given to date, though it was revealed in November that Democratic Governor Tom Wolf forced the resignation, but rumors abound that the resignation was related to the non-citizen registration debacle.

But now it appears after some initial investigation that the problem is greater than the early estimates:

Philadelphia election Commissioner Al Schmidt told state lawmakers this past week that there may be tens of thousands of non-US citizens who have registered to vote in Pennsylvania…and that for their sake, state officials should try to contact them. 

Commissioner Al Schmidt told a Senate committee that many of the non-US citizens who registered to vote in Philadelphia, perhaps unwittingly, did so through a glitch in the state’s motor voter system. While the known cases number only several hundred, he says they are all self-reported. Schmidt says more than 100,000 PA driver’s license numbers with Immigration and Naturalization Service indicators match with voter registration records. . . . "We’re not talking about an insignificant number here,” said Schmidt. “We’re talking about a potentially very significant number of thousands and tens of thousands.”

While not all of these license number hits are non-citizens registered to vote, certainly a significant number are.  As Commissioner Schmidt points out, the victims of non-citizen voter registration and voting are not only the citizens whose votes are cancelled out but the non-citizens themselves, as voter registration as a non-citizen can hinder any future naturalization process:

Schmidt says those people should be contacted. Besides the issue of election integrity, he says registering to vote – even unintentionally – will derail an immigrant’s path to US citizenship.

We will continue to follow this story and investigation.  It demonstrates the immense importance of proper election procedures and testing of election systems to ensure that there are no "glitches," whether technical or substantive, that threaten the integrity of voter registration or elections.

ICYMI: America’s Most Incompetent or Corrupt Election Official?

A very famous election lawyer once told me: in elections it is “sometimes hard to tell where the incompetence ends and the fraud begins.”  In Florida, Broward County Election Official Brenda Snipes may be the poster child for this saying.  Earlier this year, Brenda Snipes confirmed the fact that non-citizens and ineligible felons were voting in Broward County.  Last year, Snipes “engaged in ongoing violations of Florida law governing the canvassing of vote-by-mail ballots [absentee ballots]. [T]ens of thousands of vote-by-mail ballots in Broward County are being opened by your staff: (1) before they have been canvassed by the county canvassing board; and (2) without providing the public the opportunity to review or file a protest against the canvass of a ballot believed to be legally deficient.”

Of course, Snipes also made several serious errors last year:

Before the election last year, her office mistakenly sent out some absentee ballots to voters that failed to list a popular medical marijuana measure that ultimately passed by wide margins, but not before the office was sued by the Florida chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. In another case during the election, the office mailed out about 1,700 ballots that had the word “no” in Creole where it should have said “wi” for “yes.”

And now, Snipes is at it again:

The election supervisor in Florida’s second-most populous county broke the law by destroying ballots cast in last year’s congressional primary involving Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, according to election-law experts across the political spectrum. The congresswoman's opponent has sued to get access to the ballots.

Snipes’ office, however, destroyed the paper ballots in question in October — in the middle of Canova’s lawsuit — but says it’s lawful because the office made high-quality electronic copies. Canova’s legal team found out after the fact last month.

Federal law is clear that such records have to be maintained for 22 months.  Snipes is using a legally dubious (at best) argument that Florida law supersedes federal law, but as another Florida election official states:

Of the state’s 67 county elections officials, Bay County Elections Supervisor Mark Andersen is recognized as one of the most high-tech. He said he relies on state law allowing him to destroy paper ballots after making high-quality images of the records. But, he says, there’s “no way” he would destroy ballots that are the subject of a lawsuit. Other elections supervisors said they, too, would never destroy the hard copy of ballots in a lawsuit.  [emphasis added].

Snipes is seemingly incompetent, trying to hide something, or both.  Regardless, she shows the need for poll watchers and transparency to oversee the voting process.   

After Non-Citizen Voter Registration Scandal, PA SOS Resigns Abruptly

In a surprise move, Pennsylvania Secretary of State Pedro Cortes resigned late Wednesday.  The reasons for his resignation are mysterious, but many speculate that the registration of non-citizens through the "motor voter" system is to blame:

Cortes’ departure was announced in a 349-word “personnel update” emailed from Gov. Wolf’s office that offered no reason and focused almost entirely on his replacement, interim Secretary of State Robert Torres. . . . J.J. Abbott, a spokesman for Wolf, said he could not offer an explanation for Cortes’ departure. 

As secretary of state, Cortes served as the state’s top election official. His departure comes a week after State Rep. Daryl Metcalfe, chairman of the House State Government Committee, and 15 of his colleagues sent Cortes a letter “to express our dire concerns” about the disclosure three weeks ago that legal resident noncitizens in Pennsylvania had been offered the chance to register to vote while applying for or renewing drivers’ licenses at PennDot service centers. . . .

Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for non-citizens to be placed on the voter registration rolls through the "motor voter" program, an NVRA requirement that requires the DMV (or similar agency) to offer the opportunity to register to vote.  What is striking in Pennsylvania is that the problem derived from the structure of the DMV process, and large numbers of the registered non-citizens had voted:

The Department of State then said it had records of 1,160 canceled voter registrations listing ineligibility as a reason and said the issue was under review. . . . [Philadelphia City Commissioner Al] Schmidt said his staff traced the problem for 168 of the 220 documented cases to PennDot centers, where they produced immigration documents  to show they were in this country legally and eligible for a driver’s license. 

Later in the process, the applicants were asked to check a box on an electronic kiosk if they also wanted to register to vote. . . . The Department of State last month said it started changing the order of questions on the PennDot kiosks in August 2016 to address the problem.

While it is commendable that Pennsylvania has finally taken steps to resolve what Gov. Wolf's office calls a "glitch," it is remarkable that a system that allowed people to register to vote after they had proven their ineligibility lasted for so many years. 

This may just be the tip of the iceberg.  The cases that have been reported and investigated are from people who requested to be removed from the voter rolls due to ineligibility.  There may be many more non-citizens who were registered through the "motor voter" process who remain on the rolls and are still voting.

And two days later, the mystery surrounding Secretary Cortes' resignation remains, leaving us to wonder what more will come out about non-citizen registration and voting in Pennsylvania in the coming weeks.

Brennan Center Spreads Fake News; Noncitizens Are Actually Voting

The Brennan Center for Justice (BCJ) has recently been fond of tweeting over and over:

BCJ report found total of 30 cases of possible noncitizen voting—that’s 30, not 300, 3,000, 30,000, 300,000, or 3M

Turns out their numbers are an absurdly low estimate . . .  even in just one city.  Today, Philadelphia City Commissioner Al Schmidt released the following statement:

My office has identified 220 non-U.S. citizens who were registered to vote in Philadelphia at some point between 2006 and 2017. Of the 220 non-U.S. citizen registrants, 90 (41%) voted in at least one election. Of those who voted, 44 (49%) voted on one occasion, while 46 (51%) voted in two to twelve elections in the period in which they were registered. The total number of votes cast by non-U.S. citizens we identified is 227, with the largest number of votes (47) cast in the 2008 General Election. All 220 non-U.S. citizens provided documentation (e.g., signed affidavit or letter from the registrant or their immigration attorney) canceling their voter registration status on the grounds that they were not U.S. citizens and, therefore, were not eligible to register to vote.

Commissioner Schmidt traces the illegal votes to problems with Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT).  Despite having a citizenship verification procedure, PennDOT still managed to register these non-citizens (emphasis added):

The overwhelming majority (76%) of non-U.S. citizens who registered to vote either initially registered to vote through PennDOT or modified their voter registration record through PennDOT. When non-U.S. citizens apply for a driver’s license, they are required to provide stay documents to show their legal status to remain in the U.S. for at least one year.  PennDOT verifies these immigration documents electronically with the Department of Homeland Security and the applicant’s driver’s license record is marked using an INS Indicator. Nevertheless, following this interaction, non-U.S. citizen applicants – just the same as U.S. citizen applicants – are asked if they would like to register to vote using touch screen technology when driver’s licenses are issued to applicants at PennDOT offices. In addition to the possible challenge of limited English proficiency, it is also possible that – after just providing proof of their status as non-U.S. citizens – applicants believe they are eligible to vote.

“The current voter registration process at PennDOT is both harmful to election integrity and to members of the immigrant community seeking citizenship,” Schmidt said.

The last statement is important as it shows the problems with voter registration systems run through DMV.  The DMV was asking them to register to vote AFTER they had established they were not a citizen.  While the left is pushing for a much broader role for the DMV with systems such as "mandatory (or automatic) voter registration" that also serve to disenfranchise primary voters, these systems may be endangering non-citizens' immigration status.  After all, why would you ask this question after you know I am not a citizen.  

Liberal groups like the Brennan Center should stop denying that non-citizens vote and join with others that are working on fixing these problems both for election integrity and the benefit of legal immigrants seeking to become citizens.  

Another Maryland City Considers Allowing Non-Citizens to Vote

Several Maryland cities currently allow non-citizens to vote in local elections, and College Park is considering such a proposal:

The Prince George’s County city, home of the flagship University of Maryland campus and some 30,000 residents, is considering a measure to let noncitizens cast ballots for mayor and City Council — making it the latest target in a movement that has had more success in Maryland than anywhere else in the United States. . . . 

Supporters of the College Park measure say local elections center on trash collection, snow removal and other municipal services that affect people regardless of their citizenship status. The proposal, like those already approved in other small Maryland cities and towns, would not allow undocumented immigrants to vote for president, senator, congressman or governor. . . . 

Opponents say immigrants — even those in the country legally, such as green-card holders — should not be able to have a say in the direction of the community until they complete the process of becoming a citizen. . . . Jeff Werner, who advocates tighter restrictions on immigration with the group Help Save Maryland, said people who are in the country legally should have a voice in their communities, but if they are not citizens, their participation should not extend as far as voting.

Federal law controls who is eligible to vote in federal elections (U.S. citizens), but by state law in Maryland (and many other states), localities can determine eligibility requirements for local elections.  So while allowing non-citizens to vote in Maryland is completely legal (though perhaps surprising for many citizens), it is a bad policy decision.  Allowing non-citizens on the local voting rolls increases the likelihood that they will mistakenly be allowed to vote in state and federal elections.  States that allow 16- and 17-year-olds to pre-register to vote find with alarming frequency that if those underage citizens show up at the polls, they are allowed to vote.  The College Park proposal does not distinguish between legal residents and illegal immigrants, meaning that if someone has broken the law in his or her manner of entering the country, their vote would carry equal weight in local elections with a taxpaying citizen (and remember, local races are often won by very small margins).  Non-citizens are often transient and not as invested in the community as citizens.

It is unfortunate to see cities in Maryland bowing to liberal pressure to embrace this so-called "diversity" and "inclusiveness" at the expense of their citizens and at great risk to the integrity of their elections and to see increasing calls for similar laws in California and other liberal enclaves.

Legendary Partisan Democrat Election Official Brenda Snipes Confirms Vote Fraud

Democrat Broward County, Florida, Election Supervisor Brenda Snipes made a startling confession in a suit brought by the American Civil Rights Union:

Snipes acknowledged the processes her office have been using aren’t perfect and that some non-citizens and felons have voted despite not being eligible — especially right before major elections when groups are actively registering new voters.

This statement should help put to bed the argument that vote fraud is a myth.  A number of important things to note from this:

1. Despite her statement that “non-citizens and felons have voted” there have been zero prosecutions.  It is important to note again that prosecutions are not the proper way to judge vote fraud.  It also calls attention to the fact that a major election official knew that fraud had occurred but made no effort to report it.
2. Democrat and liberal groups do massive voter registration drives to make vote fraud easier.  As Snipes says, fraud happens “especially right before major elections when groups are actively registering new voters.”  This shows that the efforts of registration groups are in part aimed at flooding election officials with registrations to make it easier for fraudulent registrations to be entered.
3. “Major Elections.”  Often when we do hear stories on vote fraud, it is in local elections or Democrat primaries. The latter is often because bitter Democrat election losers are willing to expose the antics of fellow Democrats in these situations.  Snipes' statement makes clear this fraud is happen before major elections such as Presidential elections and that Democrats or their liberal allies are participating in an organized effort for illegal votes. 
4. Non-citizens and felons, as a group, vote overwhelmingly Democrat.  These illegal votes benefit Democrats and disenfranchise other voters, be they Green, Libertarian or Republican. 

Kudos to the American Civil Rights Union for bringing this serious matter to the public's attention.  

New Report: Thousands of Non-Citizens Voting in Virginia

Today, the Public Interest Legal Foundation released a disturbing report about non-citizens registered to vote and actually voting in Virginia:

After three lawsuits, scores of record requests, and reviews voter history files across 133 Virginia jurisdictions, the Public Interest Legal Foundation has uncovered the following:

• Virginia election officials quietly removed 5,556 voters for non-citizenship between 2011 and May 2017;

• 1,852 of those removed as noncitizens cast ballots;

• A total of 7,474 illegal ballots were cast from the pool of removed noncitizens;

• Some records of illegal voting date back to the 1980s before their respective removals;

• Virginia election officials routinely fail to alert law enforcement about these illegal votes or registrations.

“At the instruction of Governor McAuliffe’s political appointees, local election officials spent countless resources to prevent this information from spilling into the open,” PILF President and General Counsel J. Christian Adams said. “Virginia hid critical information that would have improved election integrity while a political operative-turned-governor vetoed numerous proposals that would’ve prevented alien registration and voting. From NoVa to Norfolk and all urban and rural points in between, alien voters are casting ballots with practically no legal consequences in response. 

“In this election year, aliens must not cast illegal ballots, and if they do they must be prosecuted. Let’s pray that Gov. McAuliffe’s veto pen did not invite a close election tainted by fraud,” Adams added. 

In the absence of regular data-sharing arrangements between federal officials and the Commonwealth, the ability of election officials to identify aliens on the voter rolls is almost nonexistent. The most that happens in Virginia is that an alien on the voter rolls will sometimes tell the state DMV they are not a citizen. Without those leads, counties and municipalities must accept false claims of citizenship on their face.

This report gives lie to those who claim that there is no problem with ineligible voters voting and determining the outcomes of elections.  In addition to other close races detailed in the full report (page 12), the winner of the 2013 attorney general election was determined by just 907 votes statewide.  As PILF noted, the methods for removing non-citizens from the voter registration rolls are far from effective or complete and the existing methods are rarely followed.  So there are likely far more non-citizens registered to vote and additional votes by non-citizens that PILF was unable to identify through their data review.  

This problem is duplicated in nearly every state across the country but has largely not been studied because it requires a tremendous amount of time and resources.  Sadly, PILF had to litigate against local election officials who refused to disclose voter registration data as required by the NVRA.  We can only hope that President Trump's Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity can conduct or prompt similar studies in a number of states and that state and local officials will cooperate, as required by law, in efforts to improve the accuracy of voter registration rolls.

More Allegations of Vote Fraud, This Time at the Nevada DMV

While the left continues to bash the Trump Administration for daring to find that instances of voter fraud occurred in the 2016 November Election, the state of Nevada has reasons to believe that illegal immigrants have voted at the hand of the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles.

Nevada Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske voiced her concerns in a letter to the DMV Director by stating:

It has come to our attention that when offering voter registration opportunities to customers, DMV’s employees offer voter registration materials to DMV customers whom they know to be non-citizens based upon their presentation of a Green Card for identification purposes... 

More specifically, it is our understanding that some DMV employees have been instructed to accept registration materials from all customers, including those who present a Green Card for identification purposes…This practice must cease immediately. Please take appropriate actions, as we have reason to believe that non-citizens have unlawfully registered to vote in Nevada as a direct result of DMV’s practices. Moreover, we now have confirmed that some non-citizens illegally cast votes in the 2016 election.

Cegavske said in a statement that her office "received verifiable evidence of potential illegal votes cast," and also stated that "the integrity of the entire election process, from voter registration to the casting of ballots, is always my number one concern."

The RNLA not only thanks Governor Brian Sandoval for vetoing a bill that would have allowed for automatic voter registration at the DMV which would have only perpetuated this type of fraud, but also Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske for taking appropriate measures to ensure that vote fraud will be stopped in Nevada.

82 Non-Citizen Voters and 385 Non-Citizens Registered to Vote Found in Ohio

To further prove the point that elections have consequences and we are in a new world of election law and litigation, compare two news stories from this week.  First, the Trump administration has dropped the Department of Justice's opposition to Texas' voter ID law on the basis that it is intentionally racially discriminatory, to give the state time to amend the law.  Second, North Carolina's new Democrat governor and attorney general are attempting to withdraw (potentially unethically) the pending petition for certiorari with the Supreme Court regarding the Fourth Circuit's decision last summer striking down North Carolina's voter ID law. 

Opponents of voter ID laws claim that they are not needed because vote fraud doesn't happen, but when voting and voter registration records are investigated, both illegal voting and the potential for it are uncovered.  An investigation by Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted has uncovered hundreds of non-citizens registered to vote in the state, 82 of whom have voted in at least one election in the last year:

“In light of the national discussion about illegal voting it is important to inform our discussions with facts. The fact is voter fraud happens, it is rare and when it happens, we hold people accountable,” Secretary Husted said. . . . 

“I have a responsibility to preserve the integrity of Ohio’s elections system,” Secretary Husted said. “When you consider that in Ohio we have had 112 elections decided by one vote or tied in the last three years, every case of illegal voting must be taken seriously and elections officials must have every resource available to them to respond accordingly.” 

Husted added that none of the cases where a non-citizen cast a ballot occurred in jurisdictions where an election was decided by one vote or tied. 

It’s possible for a non-citizen to register to vote in Ohio if they lie about their status on the voter registration form.

And there may be more non-citizen registered voters and actual voters than what this investigation found:

Husted’s review is able to identify people who have registered to vote as citizens but obtained a driver’s license as a non-citizen. . . . And Husted admits there are likely other non-citizens registered to vote in Ohio but are not in the BMV’s system. 

That’s why he has appealed to Washington for access to a federal Homeland Security database… 

“If we had access to that information we could prevent this in advance and we could find out what the probably bigger number is of people who are on the voter rolls or who have voted and shouldn’t be.”

We applaud Secretary Husted for taking the problem of non-citizen registration and voting seriously and endeavoring to keep Ohio's voter registration records clean.  And we look forward to the Trump administration cooperating with states' efforts to ensure the integrity of their elections, instead of fighting them as the federal government has for the past eight years.

Lawsuit Finds Non-citizen Voters in VA; Democrats Try to Cover Up

The Public Interest Legal Foundation has discovered that hundreds of non-citizens were removed from the voter registration rolls in Alexandria, Virginia.  The city refuses to disclose whether any of those non-citizens voted in any elections and it is unclear whether the city has forwarded the names to law enforcement authorities:

[T]he Virginia Voters Alliance and a Virginia voter (David Norcross) filed a lawsuit against the city of Alexandria, Va., claiming that the general registrar, Anna Leider, was violating the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).  The lawsuit charged that Leider failed to make her records related to the city’s voter-list maintenance procedures available for public inspection, which would obviously include all information about the removal of ineligible voters. . . . As a result of the lawsuit, the Alliance was finally able to get into Leider’s office and inspect the voter registration records. Among the items they discovered was a list containing several hundred registrants who had been removed from the voter rolls because they were not U.S. citizens. . . . 

The Alliance was not able to determine exactly how many of those non-citizens had illegally voted before being dropped from the voter list. In a letter to the Public Interest Legal Foundation, the city’s attorney subsequently claimed that the voter history of non-citizens who are removed from the voter rolls is not subject to the public records inspection provision of the NVRA. In other words, they are trying to hide whether non-citizens illegally voted. 

Whether Alexandria notified law-enforcement officials is unclear. The city’s attorney says there were some “communications to and from the Commonwealth’s Attorney’s office,” but no records concerning those communications have been released. That response indicates that the city did not turn over any records to federal authorities.

This is a problem throughout Virginia, but perhaps the most disturbing part of this story is that Virginia's election officials seem not to care that hundreds of non-citizens are registered to vote and may have voted:

Numerous other Virginia counties have refused to provide this information to the Public Interest Legal Foundation, apparently based on instructions from the State Board of Elections and individuals working for the state Department of Elections, which the Board supervises. This is what a cover-up directed by state election officials looks like. They are trying to hide hundreds, if not thousands, of instances of voter fraud that occurred on their watch. . . . 

So the next time someone tells you that we shouldn’t be concerned about voter fraud, think about the hundreds of non-citizens who have apparently illegally registered and who may have even voted in elections in the Commonwealth of Virginia. They may have been removed from the voter rolls but so far none of them has been prosecuted for violating the law. Worse, these aliens were only detected because they sought to renew their driver’s licenses and told the truth the second time when they admitted to the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles that they were not citizens. 

We have no idea how many other non-citizens remain undetected in the voter rolls of Virginia, a purple state where the outcome of the November election is still in doubt, and where the state takes no steps of any kind to verify the citizenship status of voter registrants. It is a state where the controlling members of the State Board of Elections obviously see nothing wrong with violating federal public records law, attempting to conceal illegal registration and voting, and seem to have no interest in taking any steps to prosecute those who have violated some of our most fundamental protections intended to preserve the integrity of our election process.

We applaud the Virginia Voters Alliance and the Public Interest Legal Foundation for endeavoring to protect the integrity of Virginia's elections and ensure that election officials follow the law.

Liberals vs. EAC - DOJ Earns Wrath of Judge Leon - Part 3

For the last few days we have been watching the DOJ refuse to assist the EAC, supposedly its client, to the point that the case now has Defendant-Intervenors in the form of the Secretary of State of Kansas and the Public Interest Legal Foundation. Clearly unimpressed with what he was seeing, Judge Leon wrote a brief order denying the request for a temporary restraining order (TRO) which we shared yesterday. It was fairly standard except for the one and only footnote in the document that can best be described as hilarious. 

National Review has continued to report on the action:

Judge Leon said in a four-page order that because “the registration deadlines for the Alabama and Georgia primaries and for the Kansas Republican Caucus had already passed at the time this TRO motion was filed . . . and that the effects of the [EAC’s] actions on the ongoing registration process for the Kansas Democratic Caucus . . . are uncertain at best, plaintiffs have not demonstrated they will suffer irreparable harm” before the scheduled March 9 hearing on the request for a Preliminary Injunction. Judge Leon was also “not yet convinced that plaintiffs have demonstrated a substantial likelihood of success on the merits and looks forward to the benefit of full, adversarial briefing on the complex and important issues this case presents.”

[. . .] Judge Leon castigated DOJ during the hearing and added a footnote to his four-page order about the behavior of Justice after he said he expect a “full, adversarial briefing”: 

The Court provided defendants ample opportunity to submit a written opposition to plaintiffs’ Motion for a Temporary Restraining Order and Preliminary Injunction…Defendant’s counsel, the Department of Justice’s Federal Programs Branch, took the time but upon the deadline submitted a short brief taking the extraordinary step of consenting to plaintiffs’ request — not for a TRO but for a preliminary injunction! 

The emphasis in that last quote is from Judge Leon, making it quite clear he was very critical of the Justice Department’s failure to carry out its duty to defend its client — the EAC.

[F]or a judge to refuse to accept a consent agreement of the lawyers in a case who are representing the plaintiffs and supposedly representing the defendants is almost unprecedented. And that footnote is an obvious warning to the Justice Department about its misbehavior in the case.

Judge Leon denied the request for a TRO, and sent a clear message to the DOJ. Most watching are very curious to see what will happen at the hearing on March 9 given the events that have transpired thus far. The DOJ should note what Judge Leon is saying. Otherwise, this will likely get ugly.  

Further proving DOJ's failure to its client, today the EAC requested approval to hire outside counsel from both the court and Attorney General Loretta Lynch.

A Partisan DOJ Just Provided a Brief Lesson on How to Befuddle and Irritate a Federal Judge

Yesterday, this blog addressed the EAC's purpose and its duty to the states. The DOJ is responsible for representing the EAC in legal matters, or at least that is the way it is supposed to work. The National Review released an article describing the hearing that occurred yesterday where that behavior was as far away from that expectation as possible.

The judge opened the hearing by reading into the record an astonishing letter he had just received from the chair of the EAC, Christie McCormick. It informed the court that DOJ had told the EAC that it would not defend the agency, and that it would not allow the EAC to hire its own counsel. McCormick informed the judge that she believed DOJ was not fulfilling its duty and obligation to defend the EAC and had a potential conflict of interest.

This certainly foreshadowed the DOJ’s biased approach to the issue at hand and this was almost immediately addressed by the judge.

The DOJ sought to not fight a lawsuit against the federal Election Assistance Commission (EAC), conceding to a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction filed by the League of Women voters and other activist groups. The EAC had decided to allow Kansas, Arizona, Georgia, and other states “to enforce state laws ensuring that only citizens” would be able to register to vote when they use the federally designed voter registration form.

Judge Leon called the pleading “unprecedented” and “extraordinary.” He said he had never seen such a document in his entire experience as a lawyer or a judge. He was obviously astonished that the Justice Department was not defending the agency, and it was soon clear he was not going to allow DOJ to just roll over.

As the hearing progressed, it was obvious that it was plunging further down the rabbit hole of judicial disbelief and astonishment. The DOJ, a federal entity charged with protecting other federal entities, was refusing to do so and in actuality was advocating and assisting the plaintiff?

[. . . ]Judge Leon was shocked at what DOJ had done. While he gave the plaintiffs 20 minutes to argue their case, he gave the lawyer from the Federal Programs Branch of DOJ only five minutes because he said that DOJ was obviously on the same side as the plaintiffs. He also said almost immediately that he would not grant a PI without a complete briefing and arguments on the case — despite DOJ wanting to consent to the PI. Judge Leon made clear that there was “no chance at all — zero” that he would do what the plaintiffs and the Justice Department wanted him to do on that issue.

The judge seemed literally flabbergasted at what was occurring in the court. "I've never heard of it in all my years as a lawyer," the judge said and yet, he was not quite finished expressing his disbelief.

It was clear that this hearing did not go the way the plaintiffs’ lawyers and DOJ had tried to arrange it to go. They thought the fix was in. In fact, it went so badly, particularly with DOJ being called on the carpet by Judge Leon, that at the end when the plaintiffs’ lawyer got up to try to repair all the holes that Kobach had knocked in their case, the lawyer tried to compare the EAC action to Nazi Germany. He waved the EAC opinion at issue in the air and said “this is what Nazis do behind closed doors!”  You know a lawyer is desperate when he tries to equate a dispute over an election administration issue to Nazi Germany.

Judge Leon will likely decide on the TRO today and "set a hearing for the PI on March 9, 2016."  The DOJ's behavior is potentially unethical and clearly partisan. At a minimum, the plaintiffs have learned that these are two things that Judge Leon views in a very negative light.

Obama Administration Moving to Allow Non-Citizens to Register to Vote

As the presidential primaries are well underway, the U.S. Department of Justice continues to attempt to block measures designed to keep non-citizen voters from being included in our elections.

Each vote recorded by a non-citizen residing in this country illegally or legally disenfranchises an eligible, citizen voter.  States have taken prudent steps to prevent non-citizen voting by requiring proof of citizenship when a person registers to vote.  

Why is our current administration, along with liberal groups, attacking those measures now? Because most people are distracted with the primaries themselves.

On February 12, these groups filed a lawsuit in D.C. federal court seeking to reverse a recent decision by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC). The Commission’s decision allows Kansas and other states, including Arizona and Georgia, to enforce state laws ensuring that only citizens register to vote when they use a federally designed registration form. An initial hearing in the case is set for Monday afternoon, February 22.

It's hard to envision why the DOJ would target the EAC simply for following the enacted law of the states in question except a desire to allow non-citzens to register and vote.  Most specifically because:

Under Article I, Section 2 and the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution, states have the power to set the “Qualification requisite for electors.” As with many issues, the Left disdains the balance the Framers adopted in the Constitution and objects to this delegation of power to the states. They prefer to see power over elector eligibility centralized in Washington, D.C.

The EAC is fulfilling its duties to the states as required. The DOJ is actively encouraging and participating in efforts to keep the EAC from doing so and thereby attempting to disenfranchise citizen voters by allowing non-citizens to register and vote.

Two Votes for Illegal Aliens to One for US Residents in Maryland

There should not be disenfranchisement of legal voters through fraud or chaos.  Some cities in Maryland are allowing 16 and 17 year olds to vote and now want to allow legal AND illegal aliens to vote.  Not only does this effectively disenfranchise the votes of legal US residents but as a result 16/17-year-old illegal aliens may get two votes:

A year ago, the city lowered the voting age to 16, which allowed 15-year-olds to pre-register. The election board said introducing this legislation could essentially result in some people being registered twice, which would give them two votes.

Another problem is keeping multiple voting rolls for municipal elections and another for state and federal elections.  This guarantees a mess that will lead to long lines, potential fraud, and quite frankly a mess. 

Of course, another bigger issue is when you vote in an election you should have some connection to the locality, state, or country.  It is incredible that it is even debatable that legal and illegal aliens are given the privilege of voting.  With Maryland recently electing a Republican Governor, the real reason for this may be the fact that non-resident "voters" (including illegal aliens) vote overwhelmingly Democrat.  This set of fraudulent voters led to the passage of Obamacare according to a study by two Professors. 

Even the liberal city council members recognize a potential problem.  Illegal aliens may be in the US for a short period or likely have loyalty to their home country, as one liberal councilman noted:

Councilmember Tom Wright (Ward 3) said he was on the fence about non-citizen voting because of feedback from citizens. “I also understand the concern of those residents … concerned about allowing people who may be just transient effectively [to] create legislation,” he said.

Instead of working on turning out legal voters, Democrats and liberals often work on turning out illegal “voters” -- in this case by trying to legalize illegal aliens for voting purposes.