Illinois election official says non-U.S. citizens are not registering to vote

SYCAMORE – A State Board of Elections official dispelled myths and rumors, and explained how elections are kept secure this week during a virtual panel hosted by the League of Women Voters of DeKalb County.

Faced with questions he said included falsehoods and misinformation, Matt Dietrich, public information officer at the Illinois State Board of Election addressed one falsehood he said he’s seen a lot of: Illinois and the federal government are not encouraging non-U.S. citizens to vote in elections.

“There have been a lot of social media posts alleging this, that as soon as they cross the border they’re being registered in Illinois,” Dietrich said. “That’s just not possible. It’s not happening because it’s not possible.”

On Dec. 22, a busload of 38 asylum-seeking migrants arrived from the U.S. border in Texas at Elburn’s Metra train station. That was more than a year after Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott sent about 60 migrants on buses to Chicago, a self-proclaimed “sanctuary city,” Capital News Illinois reported.

The bussing of migrants to Chicago from the Texas-Mexico border is part of what spurred the rumors of noncitizens voting in elections, Dietrich said. The other part involves state legislation.

On July 1, a law signed by Gov. JB Pritzker in June 2023 that grants undocumented immigrants the opportunity to get a standard Illinois driver’s license took effect.

“The confluence of those two things led to a really big piece of misinformation that continues to gain momentum no matter how much we try,” Dietrich said.

The Illinois State Board of Election official said because the Security of State’s office and driver’s license facilities are part of the automatic voter registration program in Illinois, some allegations have surfaced of noncitizens getting licenses and being immediately registered to vote.

“That isn’t true,” Dietrich said. “It’s not true because at the Secretary of State’s Office, anyone who does not produce a social security number when getting their driver’s license is automatically prohibited from being part of the AVR [automatic voter registration] process. So, if you’re not giving a social security number, which citizens will have social security numbers, you will not be put into AVR. You will not even get the chance to do that.”

Dietrich said Illinois, and the country, is not seeing widespread voter registration of noncitizens, and believes the number of instances it has happened in recent decades could be counted on one hand.

“This really is not something that any election authority anywhere in the country has seen happening,” Dietrich said.

Dietrich answered questions from League of Women Voters of DeKalb County representative Mary Nelson alongside DeKalb County Clerk and Recorder Tasha Sims.

Sims, who was elected to her office in November 2022, said her office conducted a voter registration maintenance program after the county approved precinct realignment in the summer of 2023. Sims’ office mailed a registration card to every registered voter in the county, and asked the card be returned to sender if addressed to someone who no longer lives at the residence it was sent to.

As a result, Sims said about 7,000 registered voters were suspended.

“We have people that go to much better climates here, so if you were away in Florida or Arizona and had your mail forwarded or stopped, we very well might have suspended that person,” Sims said. “But we try to make it as simple as possible. Say ‘I’ve lived here for 40 years,’ if you could just show us proof we’ll just get past, we’ll reinstate you right away and we can get that process moving.”

Sims said she doesn’t want voters to have to “jump through more hoops than they have to,” but stressed she believes it’s important to ensure voters live where they are registered.

To register to vote in Illinois, citizens need two pieces of identification, one that show’s their identity and another that shows their voting residence. Those requirements have not changed in decades, Dietrich said, arguing that the idea of large groups of noncitizens registering to vote with a drivers license is bunk.

“They always could have done that, they didn’t need a driver’s license to do that,” Dietrich said. “But the fact is, noncitizens don’t do that. The disincentive is just too strong. The penalty for if you’re caught registering to vote and voting if you’re not a citizen, the penalty is instant deportation.”

Illinois does not require an ID to place a vote, only to register to vote. If a majority of election judges at a voting precinct believes a voter’s signature does not match the signature they have on record, a form of identification card could become necessary, Dietrich said.

Still, proof of citizenship is not a requirement.

“No election authority in the United States can demand proof of citizenship as a condition of voter registration. That is set forth in the NVRA [National Voter Registration Act],” Dietrich said. “It was upheld by a Supreme Court decision in 2013 that said forcing voters, registrants to produce those documents is akin to being a poll tax.”