According to a report from the Public Interest Legal Foundation and reported by The Federalist, ERIC found voter registrations of tens of thousands of ineligible individuals, including deceased individuals, categorizing them as “Eligible but Unregistered” to vote.
Records obtained by the Public Interest Legal Foundation revealed that during Virginia's participation in ERIC, the partnership categorized over 168,000 deceased, relocated, or otherwise ineligible individuals as “Eligible but Unregistered” for outreach efforts funded by taxpayers. State elections officials identified and removed noncitizens, felons, and deceased individuals from ERIC's lists of potential registrants. Additionally, records from other ERIC-member states obtained by PILF indicated similar practices or no efforts to address ineligible individuals.
ERIC mandates its members to share voter registration and driver's license information with its central database. Subsequently, the organization identifies individuals with driver's licenses who have not yet registered to vote, referring to them as “Eligible but Unregistered” voters. However, ERIC's broad approach encounters issues, as many individuals meeting these criteria may either not desire to register or are legally ineligible to do so.
Virginia is joining a growing number of states in ending its association with ERIC. The multi-state partnership for voter roll maintenance has faced criticism for promoting extensive voter registration initiatives, especially its mandate for member states to contact “eligible but unregistered” voters (EBUs) based on lists compiled by ERIC.
“Elections Commissioner Susan Beals wrote upon Virginia's departure from the group that ERIC had ‘expanded beyond that of its initial intent – to improve the accuracy of voter rolls.”
Internal documents reveal that ERIC provided Virginia with a list of approximately 360,000 “Eligible but unregistered” individuals. In the months leading up to the 2020 presidential election, Virginia's Democrat-appointed elections commissioner authorized the distribution of over 2 million registration reminder postcards to individuals labeled as “Eligible but Unregistered.” Notes from a July 29, 2020 meeting involving state election officials, ERIC, and the left-leaning Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR) outlined detailed plans for a subsequent round of EBU mailings, targeting around 1.9 million individuals over Labor Day weekend. This extensive mailing effort was referred to as a “refresh” by the coordinators.
Virginia consented to provide voter registration and turnout data regarding the EBUs to CEIR for research purposes and an “outreach study,” following the “refresh” mailing and Election Day, as outlined in the foundation's report.
CEIR has an association with Zuckbucks. The leftist-led center was a major recipient of funds from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife during the 2020 election, receiving nearly $70 million in grants. This amount was approximately 70 times higher than the organization's revenues in 2017, according to nonprofit tracker InfluenceWatch.
InfluenceWatch reports that CEIR is led by David Becker, an election law attorney and former activist for People for the American Way (PFAW). Becker previously served in the voting section of the Justice Department Civil Rights Division in the early 2000s. In 2020, the former acting head of the Civil Rights Division described Becker as a “hardcore leftist” who “couldn’t stand conservatives” and “should have been disbarred” for unethical behavior.
Interestingly, David Becker, who founded the voter-roll “management” system, was recently on the board of directors of ERIC.
