Photo: Ford, Brad
More incorrect voter registrations from Oregon's Motor Voter program have been found.
DMV has been reviewing the program since more than 1,200 incorrect voter registrations were discovered. Now, an additional 302 records have been found.
123 records were missed due to a technical issue, one record was caught by new quality control measures, and 178 records were from a misclassification of people from the U.S. territories of American Samoa and Swains Island who get passports, but can't vote in all elections.
Governor Tina Kotek announced a set of actions following an Oregon Driver and Motor Vehicles Services After-Action Report detailing errors within the Oregon Motor Voter Program. The report was among an initial set of actions the Governor directed the Oregon DMV to undertake two weeks ago.
The additional actions based on the report include:
- The Governor and Oregon Secretary of State LaVonne Griffin-Valade have jointly called for an independent, external audit of the Oregon Motor Voter program. The Oregon Department of Administrative Services shall immediately identify an independent, external third party vendor to conduct the audit. The scope of the audit will be determined by the vendor.
- The Governor has directed the Oregon DMV to pause transmitting Oregon Motor Voter data to the SoS until after completion of the full-scale data integrity review overseen by a panel of external data experts, at the earliest. The review is set for completion by the end of the year. In accordance with existing procedures, the Secretary of State stopped automatically registering voters through Oregon Motor Voter on September 30, 2024.
“Any error that undermines our voting system must be taken incredibly seriously and addressed,” Governor Kotek said. “Given the findings in the Oregon DMV’s After-Action Report, an immediate, external audit of the Oregon Motor Voter program and a pause to data transmission between the Oregon DMV and SoS are imperative steps to ensuring the program can operate with integrity and accuracy into the future. I am grateful to Secretary of State Griffin-Valade for joining me in the call for an audit.”
“Thanks to the swift action of elections officials, I have full confidence that these new errors will not impact the 2024 election,” said Secretary Griffin-Valade. “The DMV’s After-Action Report raises serious concerns about this important part of our voter registration system. The first step in restoring the public’s trust in Oregon Motor Voter is a transparent review by a neutral third party operating under strict government auditing standards.”
The Oregon Republican Part is calling for an audit of all voter registrations to make sure there are no additional mistakes.