Elon Musk, Jocelyn Benson feud: Does Michigan have more voter registrations than eligible voters?

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (WOOD) — Does Michigan have more voter registrations than eligible voters? An administrative quirk in voting records was the subject of a social media back-and-forth between Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

The short answer is yes — there are more voter registrations than voting-aged citizens in Michigan. But it’s nothing nefarious: Federal law requires a multiyear delay before inactive voters may be purged from the voter roll, the state says.

Just because a voter is on the roll doesn’t mean they are actually casting a ballot.

THE EXCHANGE

It started Saturday when Musk took to X — the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, but rebranded after Musk’s takeover — to ask the community about a post that claimed Michigan had more registered voters than eligible voters.

“Michigan has more registered voters than eligible citizens!? Is that true @CommunityNotes?” Musk wrote.

Hours later, Benson responded with a post of her own.

“Let’s be clear: (Musk) is spreading dangerous disinformation. Here are the facts: There aren’t more voters than citizens in Michigan. There are 7.2 million active registered voters and 7.9 (million) citizens of voting age in our state,” she wrote. “Musk is pushing a misleading number that includes 1.2 million inactive records slated for removal in accordance with the law.”

The next day, Musk fired back.

“Jocelyn Michelle Benson, shame on you for blatantly lying to the public!” he wrote. “You only plan to remove the ineligible voters AFTER this election. That necessarily means that there are far more people registered to vote than there eligible voters.”

In her reply, Benson directed readers to the State of Michigan Election Fact Center .

Musk responded by asking whether she was removing the ineligible voters before the election.

Benson again pointed to the fact center, citing the voter registration cancellation procedures .

SO WHAT ARE THE FACTS?

The reality of the situation is somewhat complex. Information from the state indicates that there are more voter registrations than citizens of voting age, but many of the “extras” are inactive and will be canceled as soon as legally allowed. There are not more people actively voting than there are citizens, Benson said.

According to the the state’s voter registration statistics , as of Tuesday, Michigan has about 8,444,000 registered voters. Meanwhile, the state’s voting-age population hovers around 7.9 million — leaving a gap of approximately 544,000 registrations.

Benson said there are only about 7.2 million active registered voters in the state, which is well under the state’s voting-aged population.

Still, it’s true that there are more voter registrations than citizens of voting age in Michigan — but the state says these inactive registrations will be canceled. According to the voter registration statistics, about 339,000 inactive registrations are slated for cancellation in 2025, and about 258,000 more inactive registrations are slated for cancellation in 2027. That’s a total of approximately 597,000 cancellations by 2027.

Why can’t these inactive registrations be canceled now? It comes down to the law. When the Bureau of Elections gets initial information that a voter may have moved — like election mail being marked as “undeliverable,” or a person surrendering their Michigan driver’s license in a different state — then the Bureau will send a cancellation notice to the address where the voter was registered in Michigan.

“If the voter does not respond and does not have any voting activity by the second even-year November federal election following the notice, the voter’s registration is cancelled,” the state’s website reads. “After the notice is sent, the voter is marked inactive and can still vote until the cancellation occurs.”

In this situation, state and federal law requires a waiting period of two federal election cycles before the registration can officially be canceled, the Election Fact Center says .

The rationale behind the waiting period is simple, according to the state’s website: The state shouldn’t cancel a registration hastily because sometimes, initial information that a voter may have moved doesn’t mean they actually changed their voting residency. A piece of mail may have been marked “undeliverable” by mistake, for example, or a person may be living somewhere else temporarily — for school, military service or temporary work — but still want to vote in Michigan. If this is the case, the waiting period gives the voter a chance to keep their registration.

Since 2019, the state says local clerks and the Bureau of Elections have canceled over 800,000 voter registrations: 532,513 of people who have died, 273,609 of people who received a cancellation notice and did not respond or vote within the two-cycle waiting period and 16,716 of people who requested that their registration be canceled.

With over 550,000 cancellations of inactive registrations slated for 2025 or 2027, the state explained that this number is higher than it’s been in previous years “in part because Secretary Benson sent election mail to every registered voter in 2020” — the first statewide election mailing in about a decade. When mail was marked undeliverable, the state was able to send a notice of cancellation ahead of the 2022 election — but because of the legally required waiting period, the registrations couldn’t be canceled immediately.

REMOVING THE DEAD FROM THE VOTER ROLLS

The state and local clerks also work together frequently to remove the dead from the voter rolls. Ottawa County Clerk Justin Roebuck previously told News 8 that this happens in three main ways.

First, county clerks receive death records, look them up in the voter file and flag them for immediate cancellation by the local clerk.

“Every single month, county clerks have to do this. And then as it gets closer to the election, it’s every two weeks and then every week and then every day,” Roebuck said. “The closer to the election, the more we have to do it. In practice, we just do it every day.”

Second, death notices are received at the state level each week.

“So that’s every voter in the state of Michigan pinging against the Social Security Administration for deceased voters,” Roebuck said. “And so that’s a big way that deceased voters are removed.”

Finally, he said, local clerks read obituaries from their communities and remove voters accordingly.

“They’re checking the newspaper,” Roebuck said. “That’s the triple check in the system.”

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