About Election Complaints & The DOJ
Help America Vote Act (HAVA) complaints to N.C.'s state election board over voter-registration violations are at the heart of the Dept. of Justice lawsuit.
Weekly Wrap of EPEC Team Newsletter:
—Full HAVA Compliance at Center of DOJ Action against N.C. Elections Board
—ICYMI: EPEC Team’s Jon Lareau On Colorado’s Case of Altered Cast Vote Records
Election Complaints, Remedies & The Department of Justice
The Department of Justice’s lawsuit this week against North Carolina’s State Board of Elections, alleging violations of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), has thrown a spotlight on a simmering issue in many states: election officials who routinely flout election laws.
In this case, the NCSBE admitted its voter-registration forms were not collecting the required information. Although it has corrected the form, it has yet to remedy the errors on its voter rolls.
The DOJ lawsuit alleges:
“In violation of HAVA’s mandate and clear Congressional intent, the State of North Carolina used a state voter registration form that did not explicitly require a voter to provide a driver’s license or the last four digits of a social security number.”
Under Section 303(a) of HAVA, “a voter registration application for an election for federal office may not be accepted or processed by the State unless it includes a driver’s license number from the applicant, or if the applicant does not have a driver’s license, the last four digits of the applicant’s social security number.
“If an applicant has not been issued a current and valid driver’s license or social security number, the State must assign a special identifying number for voter registration.”
(The “unique identifier” is also necessary to “assure that list maintenance functions are attributable to the correct voter; so as to avoid removing registrants who happen to have the same name and birth date as a felon, for example.”)
The voter form used red text to indicate required fields — then left out key required fields. The registrations were accepted without it.
(See image from HAVA complaint below and full complaint here.)
The form has since been corrected, but not the faulty registrations.
The complaint estimates some 200,000 registrations are still on the rolls without required identifications.
As a result, the DOJ lawsuit says, the NCSBE has “failed to maintain accurate lists in North Carolina’s computerized statewide voter registration in violation of Section 303(a)(5) of HAVA.”
The NCSBE apparently decided to wait for the next election to fix the issue when voters showed up to vote. According to the complaint, they conceded that such an ad hoc approach “will not result in the accuracy of all records in the statewide voter registration list.”
The lawsuit seeks declaratory and injunctive relief to require the board follow the law and come up with a plan within 30 days to remedy the faulty registrations.
The details of the HAVA complaint, and the board’s delay in addressing HAVA violations, echoes in other states where federal and state laws are sometimes applied unevenly, or ignored.
For months in 2024, Virginia stopped supplying full month and date of birth on voter-roll maintenance records, in violation of the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA). After repeated requests, it recently returned to supplying the birth date information.
Virginia’s 2024 presidential election also saw skyrocketing Same Day Registration (SDR) applications, both during early voting and on election day.
More than 123,000 SDR ballots were tallied by the end of voting, a 4,000% increase over 2022 when the SDR statute went into effect.
In college towns, students and those claiming to be students were allowed to use a non-residential address on campus for their SDR application.
Virginia’s statute on residency requirements states: "Residence," "residency," or "resident" for all purposes of qualification to register and vote means and requires both domicile and a place of abode.
In other non-college town regions, election officials prohibited non-residential addresses for voters using SDR.
According to one HAVA complaint filed in Virginia, at least 299 Virginia State University (VSU) students were allowed to use an office address (1 Hayden Drive) to register and cast a provisional SDR ballot, according to maintenance records.
The complaint was rejected.
In N.C., the DOJ is asking the Eastern District Court to require NCSBE come into compliance with the HAVA statute, including verifying the registrations that were added without required data such as a driver’s license number, last four of a social security number, and/or a unique identifier number.
Sam Hayes, executive director of the N.C. board of elections, said the NCSBE’s failure to collect the required information on the form has been well-documented, according to N.C. television station WECT News 6.
“Rest assured that I am committed to bringing North Carolina into compliance with federal law,” Hayes said.
The election integrity issues raised in the N.C. lawsuit are a “core component of the Federal election laws that Congress has statutorily charged the Attorney General of the United States, through the Civil Rights Division, to enforce,” said Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division, Harmeet Dhillon.
States that ignore or relax their oversight of election statues are on notice . #
ICYMI:
Confirmed: Altered Vote Records in Colorado
EPEC Team members and board member Chris Rohland have been collecting Cast Vote Records from the 2024 election to analyze accuracy of election machines Virginia localities use to scan and tally votes.
We have more to say on the research in the weeks to come but as a result of our work on CVS, EPEC Team has taken an interest in a case in Colorado.
In case you missed it, the takeaways:
Arapahoe County election officials, without public notice, “quietly” revised 2020 Presidential Election Cast Vote Record data without explanation — as discovered by researchers working on a separate project.
Asked for answers, officials claimed issues with redactions and data privacy, but have not addressed the issue fully.
EPEC Team’s Chief Technology Officer Jon Lareau took a look at the work of analyst Ed Solomon and others about the CVRs and confirmed their work. Call it another peer review that validates their data.
Lareau writes:
The CVR files are intended to be official forensic records. If they are subject to manipulation and “adjustments” without transparency then that brings into question the validity of those files as forensic devices in the first place.
He published his analysis and an update on his DigitalPollWatchers.org blog. #
In our next issue: Analysis of Early Voting in Virginia’s primary election, which shows 6% turnout so far.
