Some Iowa voters may have had their voter registrations improperly canceled too close to Election Day, according to the American Civil Liberties Union and the Iowa Secretary of State’s office.
The ACLU and the Secretary of State each sent letters to Iowa’s county election officials last week reminding them that, in most cases, state law prohibits them from removing voters from voter lists as a result of voter registration challenges for 70 days before Election Day.
The letter from the ACLU also states that federal law prohibits removing voters based on large-scale, third-party challenges in the 90 days before Election Day.
Iowa Elections Administrator Emma Overschmidt wrote to county auditors and county attorneys on Oct. 23 that a nonprofit that helps monitor voter registration data told the state “that a number of counties appear to have continued processing challenge-related cancellations during this 70-day freeze period.”
“If the information that we have is correct, and your county did process cancellations as part of a voter registration challenge, we strongly suggest your offices meet to discuss whether reversing those challenges until after Election Day is prudent,” Overschmidt wrote.
Iowa law allows for registered voters to challenge the registration of other voters who live in their same county. They may allege that a voter has moved away or died.
It is deeply concerning to us that auditors may have improperly removed some Iowa voters.Rita Bettis Austen, ACLU of Iowa
According to the ACLU of Iowa, these potential cancelations were the result of “mass voter challenges.” Private parties have asked county auditors to cancel the registrations of thousands of voters in at least Johnson, Muscatine and Pottawattamie counties, ACLU lawyers said.
Rita Bettis Austen, legal director for the ACLU of Iowa, said she heard from voters who were notified that their registrations were being challenged. She said she is confident that county auditors have received the message that they should not be canceling many voter registrations this close to the election.
“It is deeply concerning to us that auditors may have improperly removed some Iowa voters,” Bettis Austen said. “And one of the things that our letter reminds auditors of is the fact that they need to restore those voters who may have been improperly removed due to those challenges.”
Bettis Austen said these challenges are not related to Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate's recent directive to challenge the ballots of more than 2,000 registered voters and require them to prove they are U.S. citizens.
She said she does not know how many voters were improperly removed from the voter list. Bettis Austen also did not have information to share about the groups behind the mass challenges.
The Secretary of State’s office said further questions should be directed to the counties.
Mass voter registration challenges have popped up all over the country in recent years, driven by people who continue to deny the results of the 2020 presidential election. According to the ACLU, these efforts are likely to wrongly cancel voters’ registrations without giving them enough time before the election to defend their eligibility.
One man challenged the voter registration of more than 600 people in Pottawattamie County this fall, according to a report by KETV.
Ari Savitzky, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU Voting Rights Project, said an individual voter challenge would involve personally knowing facts about another voter’s eligibility. But using a database to check and challenge many voters would constitute a mass challenge. He said those always have errors.
“That’s the type of work that shouldn’t be done close to an election,” Savitzky said. “And that, ideally, is done by election officials with appropriate safeguards, not close to the election, not by third parties just putting a bunch of paper in at the last minute.”
Voters can check their registration status online before going to vote. Iowans can also register to vote at their polling place on Election Day.
