(The Center Square) – Less than two weeks after 16 Republican attorneys general pressured the Department of Homeland Security for voter registration information, Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose sued.
LaRose wants access to citizenship records to continue to remove noncitizens from the state voter rolls.
“I swore an oath to uphold our state constitution, and that document clearly requires that only United States citizens can participate in Ohio elections,” LaRose said. “The Biden-Harris administration is engaging in obstruction and outright abuse of power to prevent us from removing noncitizens from our voter rolls. I take my duty seriously, so if they want a fight over the integrity of our elections, they’ve got it.”
The lawsuit says the Biden administration failed to give LaRose access to federal citizenship records four times and eventually denied the state access to the Systematic Alien Verification and Entitlements database Oct. 10.
Last week, 16 attorneys general, led by Ohio’s Dave Yost, called on Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to provide voter registration information to states, particularly when it relates to citizenship status.
The state prosecutors “raise grave concerns that by failing to work with States to verify voter registration information, your office has failed to discharge its duty ahead of a national election,” the letter to Mayorkas states.
In May, LaRose announced an effort to verify citizenship status of registered voters in the state, calling on county boards of election to review people who appear to be noncitizens from the rolls.
He also said he was taking steps to verify citizenship status that required cross-checks with other databases and asked for citizenship data from the federal SAVE database, access to citizenship-identifying records from the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration and federal District Court records.
In August, he announced more than 200,000 people were removed from the state’s voter rolls, including 500 noncitizens. He said state officials confirmed the noncitizens through federal records.
LaRose’s lawsuit also comes two days after an emergency motion was filed in the U.S. District Court in Northern Ohio to stop recently established questions and regulations for voters to show proof of citizenship before voting just days before the November election.
The filing from the ACLU of Ohio says the same court ruled those requirements were unconstitutional in 2006.
The ACLU said LaRose revised the form used by election officials to challenge voters at the polls based on citizenship. Early voting is already underway in the state.
“Requiring naturalized citizens to bring additional documentation to verify their eligibility to vote is not only burdensome and discriminatory, it’s unlawful,” said Freda Levenson, legal director of the ACLU of Ohio. “After nearly 20 years of compliance with the federal injunction, Secretary LaRose suddenly decided to defy the injunction and impose an 11th-hour requirement forcing naturalized citizens to produce these papers. We are hurrying back to the court, asking it to enforce its long-standing order.”
