Washington's Secretary of State Calls DOJ's List of 400 Noncitizen Voters Unreliable; the U.S. Attorney Says It Is 'the Tip of the Iceberg'
Fox News reports Steve Hobbs says the list includes citizens and people who are inactive or not registered. Acting U.S. Attorney Neil Floyd says some people voted as many as 27 times.
Washington state and the Justice Department are fighting over a list of alleged noncitizen voters days before the election, Fox News reports.
The federal claim. On Monday the U.S. attorneys' offices for the Eastern and Western districts of Washington said they had identified more than 400 noncitizens who are registered to vote and have voted in multiple elections. Acting U.S. Attorney Neil Floyd called it "only the tip of the iceberg." He told Fox that investigators compared U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services records with voter rolls, found about 1,500 instances of noncitizens casting ballots, and saw some people vote as many as 27 times. The earliest vote he cited was around 1984. He said he had not checked whether any of them voted in this year's midterms, because he did not want to "interfere with the current election."
The ask. A DOJ notice asks Washington to set aside ballots cast by the people on the list until their citizenship can be confirmed. It says many green card holders were registered without their knowledge through the state's Motor Voter program and then received ballots in the mail.
The state's answer. Secretary of State Steve Hobbs said the state's review found "several glaring deficiencies." "This list includes United States citizens and is not reliable," he said. He also said many people on the list are not currently registered or are on inactive status, which contradicts the federal claim that all of them will receive a ballot this year. Without individualized proof of ineligibility, he said, it would be "irresponsible and illegal" to refuse to process a registered voter's ballot.
The wider push. The DOJ is already suing California to set aside mail ballots from about 20,000 voters it says are likely noncitizens. California's secretary of state said that review "found significant accuracy problems." Separately, DHS told Fox that dozens of people have been arrested nationwide in a voter fraud crackdown, and that at least 18 of those arrested had voted in a federal election.
Note for readers: the federal and state numbers conflict and neither has been independently checked by us.