77,000 inactive voters could be taken off the voter rolls

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — Kern County Clerk-Auditor-Controller announced at a board meeting Tuesday they will be sending out notifications to inactive registered voters who must respond or get cut from the voter registry.

If you haven’t voted in the last two years and registered in Kern County, you could find yourself unregistered soon. Notifications will be sent by mail to 77,000 inactive voters, a little over 17% of total registered voters in Kern County, according to Espinoza.

“If someone doesn’t vote in an election, if we send out a ballot and they don’t respond we put them in an inactive status,” said Espinoza. “We cannot take them off the voter role unless they miss two subsequent elections.”

Recipients must respond within 15 days of receiving the notification or they will be taken off the voter roll list.

“If they respond and say ‘I’m still here, I still want to vote don’t cancel my registration’, then by law we cannot,” said Espinoza.

Tom Pavich of the Election Integrity Project, a non-profit dedicated to making sure every lawfully cast vote is counted, is floored by the number of inactive voters.

“It is a good thing voter rolls need to be updated and cleaned, but it’s astonishing the number is as large as it is,” said Pavich. “How is it that this department has allowed this many voters to remain on the voter role?”

Jim Robinson of the New California State, an organization pushing to reform a new California Constitution, spoke about election integrity at the board of supervisors meeting and gave his thoughts to 17 News.

“The 77,000 inactive voters…they were counted on May 28 and now being removed…what took them so long to do that?” said Robinson. “Why is this just now coming up? Why hasn’t this been addressed before?”

17 News tried to ask Espinoza that but she did not return our calls or texts.

Espinoza says the cuts will be fully processed by the end of July.

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