Report: Thousands in Florida may be registered to vote elsewhere

Associated Press   22 October 2004

ORLANDO, Fla. - Tens of thousands of Florida voters may be illegally registered to vote in two states, and more than 1,600 may have cast ballots in Florida and one of two other states in recent elections, a newspaper reported Friday.

Elections officials said they have few ways to prevent someone from registering in two states at once, and a lack of safeguards makes it easy for people to vote illegally, the Orlando Sentinel reported in a story for Friday's editions.

The Sentinel examination of voting records from Florida, Georgia and North Carolina found more than 68,000 cases in which voters with the same names and dates of birth were registered in two states. In 1,650 cases, records indicate those voters cast ballots in Florida and another state in the 2000 or 2002 elections.

But it is difficult to make conclusions from the voting records. The three states' voting-history databases do not include identifying information, such as a Social Security number, that would make it possible to weed out different voters with the same names and dates of birth, the paper reported.

Jenny Nash, a spokeswoman for Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood, said state election officials have no idea how many Florida voters are registered to vote in a second state, let alone casting two ballots.

But the potential for thousands of illegal votes raise alarms in a state that decided the last presidential election by just 537 votes for George W. Bush.

It is a felony for voters to cast ballots in two states in the same election. But election officials seldom check whether voters are registered in another state. There is no nationwide voting database, and only 15 states maintain a statewide voting register.

Most of the voters contacted by the Sentinel said they were unaware they were registered to vote in two states. Some said they did not cast ballots in two states despite records to the contrary.

Registration applications in Florida, Georgia and North Carolina ask people to list where they last voted. If the person does so, the new jurisdiction will notify the old one to remove the voter from the roll, election supervisors said.

But if the voter leaves that line blank, the new supervisor has no way of knowing where the voter was last registered.

Registration applications require a signature from the voter swearing that the information is true, and a warning that lying on a registration form is a felony.

"They're swearing to an oath," Orange County Election Supervisor Bill Cowles said. "We have to take the word of the voter."

Contributing to the potential for abuse is the rapid growth in absentee voting. About 700,000 Florida voters cast absentee ballots in the 2000 general election.

Doug Chapin, director of nonpartisan watchdog Electionline.org, said election supervisors are too busy with the crush of deadlines and using new voting machines to look for double voters.

"What's to prevent somebody from registering and voting in two different places?" Chapin said. "Right now, the answer is, not much, except that it's illegal and there's the prospect of getting caught."

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