COLUMBUS — Ohio Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose on Thursday asked county election officials to clear voter rolls ahead of the November election in a legally required effort to remove inactive registrations. It ordered a “routine but intensified” investigation to be launched.
“While all states are required to have an ongoing process to verify the accuracy of their voter rolls, Ohio has the most advanced and effective protocols in the nation,” LaRose said. stated in the announcement of the directive. “This work is not only important to keep elections fair, but also essential so that election officials can properly plan for the appropriate number of ballots, voting machines, polling places, and poll workers. is.”
List maintenance efforts target four specific areas:
1. Change of address. These are registrations that appear to be invalid because the voter did not confirm the change of address on file with the U.S. Postal Service with the local election board. These lists have been flagged for removal due to four consecutive years of no voter activity.
2. Overdue deletion. These are records that were previously flagged for deletion after the required four-year waiting period and identified as remaining in the system by a data integrity review conducted by LaRose's Data Analytics and Archives Department. .
3. An acknowledgment was returned. These are new registrations recognized by the county on information postcards that were returned as undeliverable. By law, these registrations are placed in a “verified” status and are set to be deleted if there is no activity from eligible voters.
4. BMV mismatch. These are registrations that do not match certain details the individual provided to the Ohio Department of Transportation, such as name, date of birth, social security number, driver's license number, etc. This process also allows flagging of deceased voter registrations.
All registrations that are considered inactive and are legally eligible for removal will be placed on a Registration Readiness Directory posted on the Ohio Secretary of State's website for public review. This is the last opportunity for individual voters and voting rights organizations to avoid having their registrations removed.
