Activist law firm says 141 counties have more voters than eligible residents, threatens to sue

An Indiana-based law firm that pushes conservative causes, the Public Interest Legal Foundation, is threatening lawsuits against 141 U.S. counties that it says has more registered voters than residents who are eligible to vote, Joe Schoffstall reports for The Washington Free Beacon. (Associated Press photo)

The PILF says the counties are not being accused of voter fraud, but are putting themselves in position to be victims of fraud, Schoffstall writes. J. Christian Adams, PILF's president and general counsel, said, “Corrupted voter rolls provide the perfect environment for voter fraud. Close elections tainted by voter fraud turned control of the United States Senate in 2009. Too much is at stake in 2016 to allow that to happen again.”

Here is a letter sent to the Wayne County, Michigan clerk. Michigan has the most counties on the list, at 24. Kentucky is second with 18, followed by Illinois, 17; Indiana, 11; Alabama, 10; Colorado, 10; Texas, 9; and Nebraska, 7. The phenomenon appears to be mainly a function of emigrants leaving their voter registration in their former county; many of the Kentucky counties are in Appalachia, which is losing population. In Alabama, “Every one of the counties has lost population since the 2010 census,” Secretary of State John Merrill told The Tuscaloosa News.
 
Franklin County, Illinois, has the biggest registration rate, 190 percent. Greg Woolard, Franklin County’s clerk and chief elections official, "said it is difficult to keep up with voters who move," Brendan Kirby reports for LifeZette. “When someone moves, we have no way of knowing. They don’t tell us,” Woolard said. “Right now, we’re in the middle of a purge. I just took office in December. I don’t think there had been one previously for a few years.”

All 10 Alabama counties on the list are located in rural areas. Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill said the counties have all lost population since 2010 and he believes that many of those people remain on the voting rolls, Mike Cason reports for The Huntsville Times. Merrill told Cason, "This is just something we inherited, but it's something we intend to fix."