Four North Carolina state lawmakers could be targets of criminal investigations for voter fraud based on controversial standards embraced by some of their own colleagues. Today Democracy North Carolina, a voting rights watchdog group, released findings that show someone with exactly the same first name, last name, and date of birth as each of the lawmakers is registered to vote in another state. The registrants’ middle names and middle initials also correspond. Earlier this year, the State Board of Elections released a report that identified 35,750 North Carolina voters whose first name, last name and date of birth matched registered voters in other states. Some state lawmakers and conservative activists claimed that was proof voter fraud was occurring — a claim that voting rights advocates challenged.
“These legislators are innocent” of fraud, Democracy North Carolina Executive Director Bob Hall said at a press conference today outside the Board of Elections offices where he announced his group’s findings. “This is the problem with using mass sets of data and drawing conclusions about voter fraud.”
Democracy North Carolina looked at the registrations of 150 North Carolina lawmakers for whom it had birth dates and compared them to registrants in eight states where records are easily accessed. The group discovered that four lawmakers — two Republicans and two Democrats — appear to be registered to vote in other states.
Full Article: Are four NC lawmakers really committing voter fraud?.