Republican states adopt more voter list maintenance bills than states with Democratic trifectas and divided governments

Fourteen states adopted new laws related to maintaining accurate voter registration rolls in the first half of 2024. Ten of these bills came from states with Republican trifectas, two from states with Democratic trifectas, and two from states with divided governments.

New laws in five states expand data-sharing procedures or create new requirements for reviewing available data from various state agencies or third-party sources to identify ineligible voters and remove them from registration lists.

In Indiana, HB 1265 requires a state to review registration records at least once per year and identify those without a birth date or those with a birth date making the voter 115 years old or older. The state then sends those identified names to local officials for review. Indiana also enacted HB 1264, which permits election officials to obtain commercially available data from a credit agency for voter address verification purposes and establishes a new verification procedure for voters identified as noncitizens by election officials.

In Kentucky, HB 580 authorizes the State Board of Elections to enter into agreements with other governmental agencies for voter list maintenance purposes. HB 44 requires the secretary of state to deliver and publish an annual report on voter registration cleanup activity to the legislature.

As part of Minnesota’s Voting Rights Act, HF 4772 creates a new requirement for the secretary of state to identify deceased voters using the Social Security Death Index.

In South Dakota, SB 18 allows the secretary of state to share information from the statewide voter registration file with any other state, territory, or locality to identify duplicate registrations. Any agreement must provide that personally identifiable information cannot be shared or sold to any person who is not an election official in the jurisdiction.

West Virginia’s SB 624 directs county clerks to cancel the voter registration records of voters who are no longer West Virginia citizens and who, according to the DMV, have obtained a driver’s license in another state.

Louisiana adopted two bills changing address verification laws. HB 114 requires the Department of State to develop an address confirmation notice that includes prepaid postage, a pre-addressed return envelope, and information about the voter’s rights. It also creates an annual sweep for inactive voters. It describes these voters as those who have failed to engage in a voting activity for ten years, including voting, requesting an absentee ballot, updating registration, and signing a petition. HB 677 eliminates a requirement that election registrars must confirm a voter’s death with the Office of Vital Records to cancel their voter registration file.

Hawaii Governor Josh Green (D) signed SB 2240, requiring the state’s Office of Elections to apply to join the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC). The bill passed the Hawaii House of Representatives and State Senateunanimously on April 24. Hawaii has a Democratic trifecta.

Bills in two states with Democratic trifectas—California and New York—that would require application to ERIC have advanced, but not been adopted.

As of July 2024, 24 states were members in ERIC, including 14 Democratic trifectas, seven states with divided governments, and three states with Republican trifectas. Eight states have resigned from ERIC since 2021, including nine states with Republican trifectas and one state with a divided government.

One bill that would have required application to ERIC was vetoed this year, Virginia’s HB 1177 / SB 606. Virginia was a founding member of ERIC in 2012 but resigned in 2023. In his veto message, Gov. Youngkin said, “Since leaving ERIC, Virginia established data-sharing agreements with numerous states incurring no additional costs.”

This article’s information is based on Ballotpedia’s State of Election Administration Legislation 2024 Mid-Year Report. The report provides insights, analysis, and takeaways from the 3,735 election-related bills we tracked in the first half of this year.