Concerns About ERIC

ERIC (Electronic Registration Information Center) is a voter-roll management system used by many states. Unfortunately, ERIC is not politically neutral.

On Monday, The Federalist posted an article saying that Alabama will withdraw from ERIC.

The article reports:

However, member states may not realize ERIC was started by far-left political activist David Becker, who has dedicated his life to attacking conservatives and advancing left-wing policies. Becker also started the Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR), one of two leftist groups that funneled $419 million in grants from Mark Zuckerberg to mostly blue counties of swing states, funding Democratic get-out-the-vote operations from government election offices in 2020. ERIC shares voter roll data – including records of unregistered citizens – with CEIR, which then reportedly creates targeted mailing lists for unregistered but likely Democrat voters and sends them back to the states for voter registration outreach.

Additionally, per government watchdog Verity Vote, ERIC doesn’t actually clean states’ voter rolls, but rather inflates them. Though member states are allegedly required to clean their voter rolls, nothing happens. A March 2022 audit by Michigan’s auditor general found the state’s Bureau of Elections failed to sufficiently clean its voter rolls, though Michigan had joined ERIC in 2019. Likewise, the District of Columbia (another ERIC member) has also been sued for its failure to clean its rolls.

The article concludes:

While Alabama’s outgoing secretary of state, John Merrill, has repeatedly signaled his support for ERIC, Allen campaigned on removing the state from the system. Instead of relying on ERIC to clean Alabama’s voter rolls, Allen plans on using change-of-address information from the United States Postal Service, driver’s license records from the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, and death records from the Alabama Department of Public Health to maintain accurate rolls.

Alabama is the second ERIC member state to withdraw from the pact. Louisiana suspended its participation in January over similar concerns.

If we are going to have honest elections, we need clean voting rolls. That’s really not that hard. When I moved from Massachusetts to North Carolina, I got a census letter from the town I lived in asking me to confirm that I still lived there. I suppose I could have lied, but it is a relatively small town, and eventually any lie would be discovered. Anyway, letters like that are how they keep their voter rolls updated. I also think that using information from the Post Office, Division of Motor Vehicles, and other public sources would be helpful in keeping voting records straight.