New York City officials have agreed to remove 441,083 ineligible voters from its voter rolls after a legal watchdog found the liberal-led government refused to clean up its list of voters as required by federal law.
Judicial Watch, a non-profit public interest law firm, filed the lawsuit after an investigation found that in six years, out of 5.5 million voters, only 22 names had been removed for moving away, dying or otherwise becoming ineligible to vote.
“This historic settlement is a major victory for New York voters who will benefit from cleaner voter rolls and more honest elections. Judicial Watch is pleased that New York City officials quickly moved to remove 441,000 outdated registrations from the rolls. We look forward to working together under this federal lawsuit settlement to ensure New York City maintains cleaner rolls for future elections,” stated Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.
In its announcement of the settlement, Judicial Watch did not state how many, if any, of the 441,083 ineligible names had cast votes. Judicial Watch brought the suit under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).
Judicial Watch's lawsuit stated:
New York City's “own recent data concedes that there were only 22 total” removals under this provision “during a six-year period, in a city of over 5.5 million voters. These are ludicrously small numbers of removals given the sizable populations of these counties.” Moreover, the “almost complete failure of Kings, Queens, New York, Bronx, and Richmond Counties, over a period of at least six years, to remove voters” under a key provision of federal law “means that there are untold numbers of New York City registrations for voters who are ineligible to vote at their listed address because they have changed residence or are otherwise ineligible to vote.”
Under the terms of its settlement, New York City has already begun cleaning its voter rolls and will now regularly remove ineligible voters.
Judicial Watch reports:
[The Board of Elections] notified Judicial Watch that, in February 2022, they removed, pursuant to Section 8(d)(1)(B) of the NVRA, 82,802 registrations in Bronx County, 128,093 in Kings County, 145,891 in New York County, 66,010 in Queens County, and 18,287 in Richmond County, for a total of 441,083 registrations.
[The Board of Elections] notified Judicial Watch that going forward they intend to cancel registrations pursuant to Section 8(d)(1)(B) in each odd-numbered year in the months following a federal election.
Specifically, the city also agrees to track in detail report its voter roll maintenance efforts through 2025:
For both 2023 and 2025 … the [Board of Elections] will notify Judicial Watch … on or before March 31, by means of separate excel spreadsheets for Bronx County, Kings County, New York County, Queens County, and Richmond County, of the number of removals, including removals pursuant to … the NVRA, made during the previous two years.
The NVRA requires states to “conduct a general program that makes a reasonable effort to remove” from the rolls “the names of ineligible voters” who have died or changed residence. Among other things, the law requires registrations to be cancelled when voters fail to respond to address confirmation notices and then fail to vote in the next two general federal elections. In 2018, the Supreme Court confirmed that such removals are mandatory (Husted v. A. Philip Randolph Inst. (138 S. Ct. 1833, 1841-42 (2018)).
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the positions of American Liberty News.
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