New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill, a Democrat, announced this week that “roughly 6,600” non-citizens were added to her state’s voter rolls between June 2023 and June 2024.
Sherrill initially attributed the error to a software vendor, calling it a “software error.” However, within hours of her statement, IDEMIA, the software vendor for the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission, clarified that the state is responsible for verifying voter eligibility. The company stated: “The voter registration information is transmitted to the New Jersey Department of State, Division of Elections, which is ultimately responsible for verifying eligibility to vote.”
Sherrill also noted that her preliminary analysis showed fewer than 400 individuals who were newly registered due to the error cast votes. These non-citizens appeared across the state as Democrats, Republicans, and Unaffiliated voters.
Critically, each of those illegitimate votes canceled out one legitimate vote — meaning a Republican or Democrat’s ballot was negated by an opposing illegal vote.
Sherrill had known about the error for weeks but delayed her public announcement until Tuesday. On the day before she made her statement, U.S. District Judge Georgette Castner dismissed the Republican National Committee’s lawsuit seeking voter data from New Jersey, ruling that the RNC lacked legal standing to bring the case.
Judge Castner, appointed to the federal bench in 2022 by former President Joe Biden, found the RNC failed to demonstrate how withholding the records caused a concrete injury or impaired its efforts to increase voter participation.
Marc E. Elias, who served as general counsel for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, described the ruling as “a win for voters.” However, critics contend that the discovery of 400 illegal votes negated legitimate ballots from American citizens.
Conservative activist Scott Presler welcomed the incident, stating: “Thank you for proving that non-citizens are both being registered to vote and voting in our elections.”
Longtime journalist Geraldo Rivera noted that the 400 wrongful votes had no impact on the state’s recent election results, as Joe Biden won New Jersey by more than 700,000 votes. Rivera also suggested that President Trump’s condemnation of the illegal voting was the primary issue.
The incident has sparked debate over the need for the SAVE America Act, which would require documentary proof of U.S. citizenship for federal voter registration and photo ID before casting a ballot. Senate Democrats have argued that non-citizens are already prohibited from voting and face prosecution for doing so.
