“Only eligible United States citizens may participate in our elections,” Secretary Nelson said. “The Trump Administration’s decision to give states free and direct access to this data set for the first time has been a game changer, and we appreciate the partnership with the federal government to verify the citizenship of those on our voter rolls and maintain accurate voter lists.”
According to the office of the Texas Secretary of State, the SOS identified 2,724 “potential noncitizens.” The press release states the state provided the voter files to Texas counties, who will now conduct their own investigations into the eligibility of the voters.
The release also states that individuals who are “deemed” noncitizens who voted in a Texas election will be referred to the Office of the Attorney General.
According to the data released by the office of the Texas Secretary of State, 15 counties in the Texas Panhandle had individuals who were “potential noncitizens” who were on the voter rolls, including:
MyHighPlains.com spoke with the Potter County Election Administrator, Christy Benge, and the Randall County Election Administrator, Shannon Lackey, about the data and what the county is doing next.
“They did send us a file on Thursday,” Benge said. “There were nine noncitizen names within that file. We also received a file for 400 deceased. We are currently working on both lists. State law does require us to send each noncitizen a notice to confirm their citizenship status. They have 30 days to confirm citizenship status, and after 30 days, if they don’t confirm or don’t respond at all, then their registration will be canceled.”
Benge also said she was surprised that Potter County had a file.
“Maybe once in the last ten years we had come across one noncitizen, but I was surprised we had any,” Benge said. “I was definitely surprised I had a file with over 400 deceased voter names in it, but we are actively working that file as well.”
Lackey said that Randall County was also notified of five “potential noncitizens” registered to vote in the county.
“Through our investigation, one of them was registered in error by a former staff member, so they were immediately canceled,” Lackey said. “That person actually checked no on their voter registration, and just through human error, they were registered.”
Lackey noted that the person never cast a ballot. The four others on the list were sent a letter that is prescribed by the Secretary of State, just like the nine individuals in Potter County.
“If they don’t respond within 30 days, they do get canceled from the voter rolls,” Lackey said. “We would then have a conversation with our district attorney’s office and see if any further action needed to be provided.”
Lackey emphasized that having clean voter rolls is always the goal.
“It is extremely important to all of us,” Lackey said. “Not only does it undermine the election process, it undermines voter confidence. And those of us that do this around the state work daily to ensure voter confidence. I’ve talked to several people around the state today, and in the last couple of days, everyone is pursuing the actions that the law requires us to do.”
Lackey noted that the number of voters identified in the data is only 0.004% of 100,000 registered voters in Randall County.
“Again, that’s too many,” Lackey said. “We want this cleaned up. Now, because the Secretary of State does have access to the SAVE database, that’s where all this information has come from. This is all information that none of us have ever had access to until now. One of these voters has been registered since 2009. This isn’t a new surge, per se. We are just actively working to follow the law.”
Lackey also noted that all four individuals could come back with proof of citizenship. Randall County also received a separate file, according to Lackey, of 500 deceased individuals on the Randall County voter roll
“Probably a third of those we had already canceled, but there were several on there that we had to go in and cancel before early voting began on Monday morning,” Lackey said. “Every name that was on that list has been processed for Randall County and removed from the voter rolls.”
Lackey stated that there is no automatic cancellation for when a death has occurred and emphasized that families factor in the step more often.
“I realize that when someone passes away, there’s so many things that you have to do,” Lackey said. “Canceling voter registration is not high up on a checklist, but unless we get notification from the state or the city in which the death occurred, we can’t just automatically cancel someone.”
According to the press release from the Texas Secretary of State, Texas was among the first states to partner with USCIS to compare its voter list with the SAVE Database and initially focused on who may have voted “illegally” in the November 2024 election. The release notes that 33 voters from the initial review were referred to the Office of the Attorney General in June.
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