But then it never prosecutes fraudulent voting -- which means there is no deterrence to it.
The other way federal and state governments encourage and facilitate illegal voting is by making it difficult or even impossible to check voter registration lists for noncitizens illegally signed up to vote.
Again, they claim that they have "systems in place" to detect illegal voting... but then do everything possible to sabotage those "systems."
Republicans highlight a recent study estimating that 10% to 27% of noncitizens are illegally registered to vote, and 5% to 13% will illegally vote in 2024 -- a potentially massive number given the illegal alien portion of the noncitizen population alone numbers well over 10 million. Election integrity advocates argue that states have not found many incidents of noncitizen voting for the simple reason that authorities, including the Department of Justice, do not look for it.
"DOJ investigations of illegal voting are all but nonexistent," Sen. Mike Lee, a Utah Republican, said in a recent floor debate concerning the SAVE (Safeguard American Voter Eligibility) Act, a bill Lee and House colleague Chip Roy (R-Texas) introduced to combat noncitizen voting. After the House passed the measure in July, Democrats blocked the legislation in the upper chamber, where it remains stalled.
"[T]oo many prosecutors refuse to enforce the law even when such illegal behavior is discovered by election officials or others," Hans von Spakovsky, a former Department of Justice official who now works at the conservative Heritage Foundation, told Congress in May.
Should election officials fail to prevent noncitizens from casting ballots on the front end, J. Christian Adams, a fellow former DOJ official and president of the Public Interest Legal Foundation, told RCI, there is "almost nothing" the public or political parties can do on the back end to identify, challenge, and invalidate noncitizen votes prior to election certification.
Adams' group has documented myriad electoral races decided by one vote or tied over the last two decades -- something he and others argue indicates just how critical it is to combat illegal voting, given the potential impact to tight races up and down ballots.
States generally seem unfazed by the prospect of noncitizen voting...
Most state officials who responded to RCI's query emphasized that there are laws on the books permitting third-party challenges to voter eligibility. But this is a measure requiring time, money, and effort. The two former Justice Department officials -- Spakovsky and Adams -- recently took issue with the view that state audits and scrubs of voter rolls ought to inspire confidence, writing in the Daily Signal:
Because almost no state even attempts to verify that individuals registering to vote are U.S. citizens -- and because the federal government, including both the courts and the executive branch, have put up significant barriers to such verification -- we don't really know how many aliens, whether here legally or illegally, are registering and voting.
Whatever the extent of noncitizen registration and voting today, Election Integrity Network leader Cleta Mitchell says conditions are building for a "perfect storm." Two factors are about to produce it: "the invasion of our country by millions of illegals" and a series of largely Democratic Party-driven efforts to ease voter registration and participation.
Mitchell and others, including the Heritage Foundation's Oversight Project, have suggested that significant numbers of noncitizens could wind up on the voting roles under Biden administration Executive Order 14019, which directs every federal agency to register and mobilize voters.
Officials in Alabama and Mississippi say that under the executive order, which RCI has previously examined, authorities are already attempting to register noncitizens to vote. The Biden administration initiative calls on federal agencies to coordinate with third-party groups in pursuit of its objectives as well. Adams, testifying alongside Spakovsky for the Republican majority before the House Administration Committee in May, said that "most often noncitizens are getting on the rolls through the motor voter registration process or third-party registration drives."
Regarding motor-voter registration, the Only Citizens Vote Coalition warns that "many states are now automatically registering people to vote at the time of coming into contact with the DMV unless the person 'opts out' of registration."
Advocates are also concerned that practices like same-day voter registration and allowing the use of student IDs to vote -- IDs that can be issued to foreigners -- could lead to noncitizens ending up on voter rolls and potentially voting.
Weingarten notes that the left is eagerly courting the fraudulent noncitizen vote:
"Immigrants pay taxes, they use city services, their kids go to our public schools. They are part of our community. And they deserve a say in local government," New York City Council Speaker Corey Johnson said in defending a bill that has been ruled unconstitutional that would have allowed an estimated 800,000 noncitizens to vote in local elections.
The Trump-Vance campaign, by contrast, has called for mass deportation of the illegal alien population to which Democrats increasingly wish to extend rights and benefits, among other immigration measures the Republicans say aim to protect and support Americans. In contrast to the growing coterie of blue-state jurisdictions embracing noncitizen voting, red states are increasingly passing amendments prohibiting local governments from allowing noncitizens to vote, with Louisiana and Ohio most approving such constitutional changes in 2022. Eight more states have citizenship-related ballot measures in the 2024 election.
Gee I wonder which party the illegals will be voting for. I guess it's a mystery which can never be solved.