Some non-citizens end up registering to vote, but usually do not: NPR

About five years ago, immigration lawyers began contacting Pennsylvania's election officials to announce that a large number of their clients had gone to get a driver's license and a few weeks later they were receiving a voter registration card in the mail.

Sundrop Carter, executive director of the Pennsylvania Immigration and Citizenship Coalition, said it was particularly worrisome for immigrants trying to become citizens.

"I've received this by mail, I do not know why," he said. she said, they would talk to their lawyers. "I did not think I was eligible to register to vote. Really? Should I go to vote?"

The answer was definitely "no" It would be illegal (non-citizens are not eligible for federal elections, but a handful of jurisdictions allow them to vote in some local races).

Since 1995, federal law has required states to provide citizens with the opportunity to register to vote when they visit a local motor vehicle office.

But it turned out that Pennsylvania, like some other states, was asking this question to anyone who was applying for a driver's license or a state identity card, even though those carrying green cards or other documents identifying them as non-citizens.

This is often confusing for immigrants who come to get a driver's license or an ID card, which non-citizens have the right to do.

The issue remains a challenge for states, especially as President Trump and other Republicans have alleged – without any evidence – that tens, if not millions, of non-citizens would have illegally registered and voted in American elections.

Texas officials recently announced that 95,000 non-citizens appeared to be on the state's electoral lists. Since then, these figures are seriously wrong, but this has not prevented Trump from insisting that such fraud is widespread.

While allegations of massive illegal voting by non-citizens have been systematically refuted, some non-citizens have ended up on the lists, usually by accident.

"What is the" vote ", what should I do?"

Immigrants like Asife, who were living in Pennsylvania with a student visa in the early 2000s, were disoriented by the process of obtaining a driver's license and were accidentally registered to vote (NPR n & rsquo; Not using his full name because he was technically illegal and concerned about the repercussions in his community).

"When I come here, I do not speak English at all, as I hardly know, as you know, a few words," he says.

He did not understand what the clerk was asking him, especially because Asife came from a country where elections rarely take place.

"The guy over there did not explain what's the" vote ", which I should do.He just looked at the screen and he said," D & D Agree, answer this question. "And as if I had no idea," Asife said.

He signed the form and forgot it until he applied for citizenship seven years later and learned that he was illegally registered to vote. Asife never really voted and could become an American citizen.

After hearing hundreds of similar stories, Pennsylvania officials realized that they had a problem. They decided to change their system so that one of the first questions that people ask for a driver's license is "Are you a citizen?" If the answer is no, we never ask candidates if they wish to register to vote. The forms are also available in 14 languages ​​instead of two.

David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation & Research, says other states are also inadvertently recording non-citizens. Sometimes it's just a misunderstanding between the motor vehicle service and the election officials to determine who is responsible for verifying citizenship.

Small number of votes

Becker said that the number of non-citizens who end up on the lists is relatively small and the number of those who vote is even smaller. Pennsylvania officials estimated that identified non-citizens had collected 544 votes between 2000 and 2017, out of a total of 93 million.

"Again, a small drop in the bucket compared to eligible voters, but we clearly want to avoid it," Becker said.

He notes that non-citizens can face serious lawsuits – dozens of them have recently been prosecuted in North Carolina and Texas. It also undermines public trust and opens the way for even unfounded allegations of electoral fraud.

"My concern is that it risks jeopardizing confidence in the electoral process," said California Secretary of State Alex Padilla last fall. It emerged that some 1,500 people, including non-citizens, had been mistakenly registered under the new law on automatic voter registration. Registrations were canceled, but this raised questions about other mistakes.

Padilla said the problem was to enforce the new law – in which every eligible voter is registered except when he renounces it – while the California Department of Motor Vehicles was upgrading his system.

West Virginia is now facing a similar challenge. He is expected to start automatically registering voters at the Division of Motor Vehicles on July 1, but election officials and the DMV are asking for a deadline.

"We have a day of voter registrations that do not materialize, we are making headlines all over the country," warned the state attorney general's office of the Secretary of State, Donald Kersey, earlier this month.

The state DMV now rests on a central computer over 26 years old which needs to be updated.

Kersey says that there are already problems. Some legitimate listings are lost, while non-citizens can be registered.

"Under the current system, non-citizens can just say, or can misunderstand, and just say yes, I'm eligible, I'm an American citizen, I'm a resident of West Virginia," Kersey said. "They can, I'm not going to lie, but they can make a mistake and say yes, and they receive a voter card by mail.They probably think that they have the right to vote now." And then they will vote and they have committed a crime. "

Kersey says the numbers are tiny – the state is currently suing only a non-citizen voter – but that's worrisome when many local elections are decided by 10 votes or less. A bill to delay by two years the automatic registration of voters is being examined by the state legislature. It would also put in place a new system to ensure that people who register are US citizens.