Columbus County elections officials were removing ineligible voters well before the recent lawsuit against the state state elections board and increased calls for more oversight of the state board.
Voter rolls have come under more scrutiny in recent weeks since the state Republican party has filed a lawsuit over 225,000 voters statewide that they say were illegally registered without proper identification. The state Board of Elections on Thursday said more than 747,000 ineligible voters have been removed since January 2023 – 1,200 names per day.
Columbus County Elections Supervisor Ashley Collins said that between Jan. 1 2022 and Sept. 27, a total of 5,396 names were removed from the pollbooks. Columbus had 37,341 registered voters as of Sept. 27.
North Carolina has just over 7.7 million voters, with a U.S. Census estimate of 10.7 million residents. Critics are questioning how many of the 747,000 were allowed to vote in recent elections before being purged. It is not clear in the lawsuit or SBOE data how many of thosen 225,000 voters cited by the Repubklican lawsuit have been purged by the state.
Columbus County has 37,371 registered voters out of a population of 49,885 people.
Voters can be removed from the state rolls due to death, moving out of state, a felony conviction, or not voting in two consecutive federal elections. Local officials also remove voters who have changed addresses and registered in another county, resulting in a duplicate registration. Voters can also request to be removed from the poll books. Persons who are the subject of a successful voter challenge can also be removed.
The SBOE said moving without leaving a forwarding address was the most common cause for purging. Columbus County data shows removals from death and relocating to be the primary reasons for voters being removed.
Non-citizens are not allowed to register, the State Board said. A proposed state constitutional amendment on the November ballot would further strengthen rules against non-citizens voting in local, state or federal elections. The amendment was proposed after several statesbegan allowing non-citizens, including illegal immigrants, to cast ballots in local elections.
Columbus continues to follow the statewide trend toward more Republican and unaffiliated voters, according to state data. Currently, 13,405 voters here are registered Democrats. Republican voters total 11,258, and unaffiliated voters 12,532. The Green, Libertarian, We The People, No Labels and Justice for All parties have 132 voters total, the majority of whom (117) are Libertarians.
Male voters make up the mninority of the county’s pollbooks, at 15,906 to 18,778 females. White voters outnumber African Americans 22,732 to 10,431. Voter regiostations indicate 959 Indians, 70 iof Asian decsent, 612 of Latino descent, four Pacific islanders, and 2,798 who did not designate a race on registration information.
Democrat registrations continued a slow fall from February through the Democrat national convention, when Vice President Kamala Harris was appijnted to replace Democrat Joe Biden for nthe presidential nomination. The co-called “Harris Bump” led to around 440 new Democrat reigstrations statewide in the first week, with numbers generall dropping back to about even with Republicans since mig-August.
Voter registration ends October 11 for the November 5 election. In person early voting begins October 17. All voters must present an acceptable form of identification when casting or returning a ballot. Free voter IDs are available at the board of elections office.
