DMV search of records turns up ineligible NC voters
DMV search of records turns up ineligible NC voters
POSTED 9:37 PM, OCTOBER 21, 2014, BY WINSTON-SALEM
http://localtvwghp.files.wordpress.c...0&h=225&crop=1(WGHP File Photo)
The Winston-Salem Journal reports that the voter rolls kept by the State Board of Elections contain 145 names that belong to a certain category of ineligible voter – immigrants in the U.S. under a federal program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, according to elections officials.
Josh Lawson, an SBOE spokesman, said that election officials found out about the number Tuesday night, after the N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles ran a specific search for drivers with DACA licenses.
Letters from the SBOE will be sent to the 145 people asking for documentation that they are U.S. citizens, Lawson said.
More people who are ineligible because they are not U.S. citizens may be on the voter rolls.
Nearly 10,000 names on the rolls are tagged by the DMV as “legally present,” according to elections and transportation officials. But that doesn’t mean that all 10,000 are ineligible to vote at this time. These are license holders who were not U.S. citizens when they got a license. They may have been green-card holders, foreign workers or foreign students, for example.
Most have become U.S. citizens since getting a license, according to an estimate by elections officials based on a sample of the overall list.
Earlier this month, State Board of Elections officials sampled about 1,600 of the 10,000 names, Lawson said. They cross-checked the names against a U.S. Department of Homeland Security database, known as SAVE, and found that 94 percent of those 1,600 are in fact U.S. citizens, Lawson said.
They are eligible to vote.
Some may still show up on the DMV database as legally present – not a U.S. citizen – because there is no requirement for a person with a driver’s license to get a new license – which would update the DMV database – when he or she becomes a U.S. citizen, according to Mike Charbonneau, a DMV spokesman.
Still, if 94 percent are U.S. citizens, then 6 percent are ineligible. If that percentage holds against the whole list of nearly 10,000 names, then about 600 people on the voter rolls would be ineligible to vote.
DMV is working to cross-check all the names, Charbonneau said.
15,000 have DACA licenses in NC
Nobody should be on the voter rolls if they are not eligible, said James Johnson, president of NC FIRE, an advocacy group based in Cumberland County that supports the enforcement of immigration laws at the state level.
“One shouldn’t be there,” Johnson said. “That’s what we were afraid of when they started issuing DACA licenses.”
The work by the SBOE and DMV to verify the 10,000 names was in the works already, according to Lawson, but it also dug deeper after NC FIRE and the Voter Integrity Project separately asked about the possibility that DACA immigrants may be on the voter rolls.
In the U.S., more than 550,000 younger immigrants, raised mostly in the U.S. but who did not have authorization to be in the country, have qualified for DACA, according to August statistics from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
They paid a $465 fee to USCIS plus about $500 to $1,000 in attorney fees to apply for the program, which was implemented by President Barack Obama’s administration two years ago on Aug. 15, 2012.
In North Carolina, the DACA program allows recipients to get a Social Security card, work permit and driver’s license. In the state, with a total population of about 9.5 million people, nearly 20,000 have received approval for DACA, according to the latest USCIS statistics, through March 31.
About 15,000 DACA licenses have been issued, according to the latest statistics provided by DMV officials.
They have lawful presence in the U.S. but have no pathway to citizenship.
As such, it would make sense for the SBOE to cross-check its voter rolls for people with DACA licenses, said Jay DeLancy, director of the Voter Integrity Project, based in Raleigh.
“We would like the DMV to work with the State Board of Elections on LP (legally present) and DACA. They should cross check immediately. We want that cross-agency accountability on a regular basis,” DeLancy said.
http://myfox8.com/2014/10/21/dmv-sea...ble-nc-voters/
Ineligible DACA Beneficiaries Discovered on NC Voting Rolls
by Caroline May 22 Oct 2014, 11:39 AM PDT
breitbart
With the North Carolina U.S. Senate race in a dead heta, state election officials say they have discovered 145 names on the voting rolls who are ineligible to vote because they are illegal immigrants who have been granted President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals status.
According to a Winston-Salem Journal report, the State Board of Elections discovered the potential illegal voters Tuesday night when the N.C. Division of Motor Vehicles ran a search for DACA licenses. The 145 DACA recipients whose names appear on the SBOE’s voting rolls will be sent letters requesting documentation that they are citizens, the report noted.
DACA beneficiaries in North Carolina are able to obtain drivers licenses, but they are not able to vote.
The Journal notes that it is likely more ineligible people may still remain on the voting rolls.
Nearly 10,000 names on the rolls are tagged by the DMV as "legally present," according to elections and transportation officials. But that doesn’t mean that all 10,000 are ineligible to vote at this time. These are license holders who were not U.S. citizens when they got a license. They may have been green-card holders, foreign workers or foreign students, for example.
Most have become U.S. citizens since getting a license, according to an estimate by elections officials based on a sample of the overall list.
According to the report, earlier this month the SBOE officials did a sample cross-check of 1,600 of the 10,000 “legally present” names against a Department of Homeland Security database and found that 94 percent were U.S. citizens and eligible to vote. However, that still meant that six percent were ineligible, meaning if the ratio held for the whole 10,000, 600 people would be ineligible.
Mike Charbonneau, a DMV spokesman, told the Journal that it is now cross checking all the names.
While the officials work to cross check names, early voting is set to start in the state Thursday.
“We want to know how such a large number of non-U.S. citizens were ever registered to vote in the first place,” Jay DeLancy, executive director of the Voter Integrity Project of North Carolina, told Watchdog.org. “There is clearly a system failure here and we need the Board of Elections and the DMV to help the Legislature and the public understand where the problem lies.”
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm...C-Voting-Rolls
Three ways to increase voter turnout in North Carolina
Three ways to increase voter turnout in North Carolina
BY SHOSHANNAH SAYERS
October 23, 2014 Updated 18 hours ago
Here is one safe prediction for next month’s elections: After the votes are counted, the winners give victory speeches and the losers their concessions, both sides will declare disappointment in the low turnout in many of our communities.
Less than half the state’s registered voters are likely to participate in the local-heavy Nov. 4 mid-term elections. Of those, people of color and the young will vote in proportion much lower than their share of the state’s population. In 2010 – the most recent midterm – nonwhites made up 26 percent of the eligible voting population, but only 22 percent of the people who voted.
For young voters, the numbers are even worse. In 2010, voters under age 30 made up 22 percent of the eligible voting population but only 8 percent of the voters who cast ballots.
We can do better. We have the greatest democracy in the world, but we can’t say our elections are fully free, fair and accessible when entire communities clearly don’t find them so.
Our system of government depends on broad citizen engagement and voter participation. Here are three things we can do right now to encourage those ideals and count more votes.
1 Simplify the registration maze
In North Carolina, as in most states, the rules for registering to vote are pre-digital technology. And they rely almost entirely on citizens to keep registration current, such as notifying elections officials when they move.
Only about 86 percent of eligible North Carolinians are registered; in Canada it’s 93 percent. The difference is Canada has universal registration, where the government automatically signs up citizens to vote.
We already have the tools in place, through the state Department of Motor Vehicles, the Social Security Administration and even Selective Services. When young men turn 18, the government finds them and ensures they sign up for a draft that doesn’t exist. Why not register them to vote at the same time?
2 Ditch the booth
In Colorado, Oregon and Washington, registered voters receive ballots that they can return by mail. Voters in those states can mark their ballots in their living rooms at their convenience. There’s no need to take time off work, drive to a polling site and stand in line.
The result is consistently higher voter turnout. A Portland State University researcher estimated that if all 50 states did this, 20 million more votes would be cast in national elections, and a whopping 50 million ballots would be counted in primary elections.
3 End political gerrymandering
Close races that encourage candidates to meet voters and take positions generate citizen interest. But increasingly precious few of our legislative elections are competitive.
Just 41 of 120 seats in the General Assembly were seriously contested past the primaries, according to the bipartisan N.C. Coalition for Lobbying & Government Reform. This is in large part because the district lines are drawn every 10 years by the party in power. To ensure its candidates win, a party creates districts that skew partisan, whether or not it makes sense geographically.
Iowa, on the other hand, has strict guidelines in place for redistricting and a nonpartisan board to do the drawing.
Voters across the state are choosing county commissioners, school boards, state legislators, sheriffs, judges and district attorneys. Those elected will make vital decisions about economic opportunity and the quality of life in their communities. A U.S. Senate race could determine the direction of our federal government.
Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2014/10/...#storylink=cpy
http://www.newsobserver.com/2014/10/23/4258936_3-ways-to-increase-voter-turnout.html?rh=1
