The U.S. Department of Justice has given Gov. Mikie Sherrill five business days to turn over the identities and voting records of roughly 6,600 noncitizens mistakenly registered to vote in New Jersey, escalating the state’s voter registration controversy into a federal civil rights investigation.
In a letter sent to Sherrill yesterday, Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon demanded the names, dates of birth, nationalities, residential addresses, and registration dates and locations of all 6,600 people affected by a software failure at the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission.
Dhillon, who leads the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, also requested records identifying when and where approximately 400 of those individuals cast ballots, along with certification and signature records for anyone who voted by mail.
“Ensuring that U.S. citizens’ votes are not illegally diluted by noncitizens’ votes is of paramount importance,” Dhillon said in her letter.
The demand came hours after Sherrill disclosed that approximately 6,600 people who identified themselves as noncitizens while applying for driver’s licenses or identification cards were nevertheless registered to vote between June 2023 and June 2024. Fewer than 400 subsequently voted, according to the governor.
Republican National Chairman Joe Gruters told the New Jersey Globe yesterday that he believes the Justice Department should prosecute any noncitizen who voted illegally.
The computer glitch began nearly three years before Sherrill took office and was corrected in June 2024, but it was not publicly disclosed until this week. Sherrill said she learned about the problem last Wednesday and immediately ordered an independent investigation.
At a statehouse press conference yesterday, Sherrill called the situation “unacceptable” and blamed a software defect involving IDEMIA, the French identity and security technology company that works with the MVC.
The affected individuals had answered “no” when asked whether they were U.S. citizens and therefore eligible to register. Despite that response, their information was transmitted through the motor vehicle voter registration system.
IDEMIA has said its role is limited to transmitting information through the MVC system to the state Division of Elections, which is responsible for validating voter eligibility.
The Justice Department said the requested information is needed to determine whether New Jersey has complied with federal election laws, including the Help America Vote Act of 2002 and the National Voter Registration Act of 1993.
Dhillon also instructed Sherrill to preserve all records connected to the disclosure, a directive that could signal potential litigation or a broader federal inquiry.
The letter marks the latest confrontation between the Trump administration and New Jersey over access to the state’s voter rolls.
Dhillon said the Justice Department would notify the federal judge overseeing United States v. Caldwell about the state’s disclosure. The pending lawsuit seeks to compel New Jersey to provide the federal government with an electronic copy of its statewide voter registration list.
New Jersey election officials have so far declined to turn over the database, according to Dhillon.
“It provides an additional basis for the Civil Rights Division to obtain an electronic copy of New Jersey’s statewide voter registration list, which, to date, New Jersey election officials have failed to produce pursuant to the Civil Rights Act of 1960,” she wrote.
The Justice Department previously sought additional election information from New Jersey in a July 7 letter to Lt. Gov. Dale Caldwell, who serves as secretary of state and oversees the Division of Elections.
The new demand gives federal officials access to far more detailed information than the aggregate numbers disclosed by Sherrill, including personally identifying information for individuals who may have been registered through no fault of their own.
Sherrill has said the state is working to identify all affected individuals, remove anyone who remains ineligible from the voter rolls, and determine how the failure went undetected for years.
She has also promised to make the findings of the independent investigation public and said the state is moving away from IDEMIA.
Earlier today, Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-Tenafly) sent a letter to the directors of the General Services Administration and the Office of Management and Budget asking for a full review of IDEMIA federal contracts to ensure that security glitches don’t affect sensitive areas like TSA PreCheck and the Hazardous Materials Endorsement Threat Assessment Program,
The disclosure came less than a week after President Donald Trump claimed during a prime-time address that 35,152 noncitizens were registered to vote in New Jersey. The 6,600 registrations acknowledged by the state represent only a portion of Trump’s figure, and the administration has not publicly established that his larger estimate is accurate.
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in a statement to the New Jersey Globe on Tuesday that “this latest incident underscores the absolute necessity of the SAVE America Act.”
It remains unclear which elections the approximately 400 individuals participated in, whether any voted more than once, or whether their ballots affected the outcome of any race.
Dhillon said the Civil Rights Division was prepared to help New Jersey bring its election practices into compliance with federal law.
“We look forward to working with you on this matter,” she told Sherrill.
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October 17, 2023 -
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