More than 300 non-citizens in Oregon eligible to apply for driver’s licenses were also mistakenly registered to vote, officials admitted this week in what they chalked up to be a “data entry issue.”
In an initial analysis, the Oregon Department of Transportation found that 306 non-citizens statewide were registered to vote and two have cast ballots in elections since 2021, according to reports.
It is illegal for for a non-citizen to cast a ballot in a federal election.
Officials expect to find more instances of the error as they continue to investigate, DMV Administrator Amy Joyce told The Oregonian on Friday.
“It’s basically a data entry issue,” said Kevin Glenn, spokesperson for the Oregon Department of Transportation, which oversees the DMV.
Oregon passed a “motor-voter” law about a decade ago, which automatically registers people 18 and older to vote when they apply for a new license or renew an existing one. Then, in 2019, the state passed a law that allows certain people without proof of legal residence to obtain a driver’s license, paving the way for the potential error, according to the Willamette Week.
The hundreds of erroneously registered people “will be notified by mail that they will not receive a ballot unless they demonstrate that they are eligible to vote,” Oregon Secretary of State LaVonne Griffin-Valade said Friday in a statement. Oregon conducts all elections with mail-in ballots.
“While this error is regrettable, the secretary and the Elections Division stand by automatic voter registration and its many benefits,” Griffin-Valade added.
Gov. Christine Kotek said the error was discovered because the DMV and the secretary of state were doing their “due diligence” ahead of the 2024 election.
“The Oregon DMV is taking urgent corrective action to prevent any such error from occurring in the future,” Kotek said. “This situation will not impact the 2024 election in any way.”
The DMV is auditing its files and county clerks have been told to remove ineligible names from rolls. Many candidates for office in the state came out demanding a full-scale investigation into the mishap.
Most states in the US give applicants for welfare benefits, driver’s licenses, and in some cases, federal voter registration forms without requiring proof of citizenship, The Post reported in June.
Republicans and conservatives are demanding action to prevent voter registration forms going to migrants with no proof of citizenship.
The Trump campaign, the Republican National Committee and the Nevada GOP filed a suit Thursday in the swing state of Nevada, where as many as 11,000 noncitizens in the state’s Department of Motor Vehicles system were registered to vote in 2020.
With Post wires
