LaRose refers 41 potential voter fraud cases for prosecution

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Secretary of State Frank LaRose announced Tuesday he is referring evidence of potential election fraud to Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost and a number of attorneys general across the country for “further review and potential prosecution.”

Besides Yost, the referrals were sent to attorneys general in eight other jurisdictions: Virginia, Arizona, Colorado, District of Columbia, Illinois, Kentucky, Maryland, and South Carolina, according to LaRose’s office.

These cases were identified through an ongoing review of Ohio’s voter registration database by the secretary’s Election Integrity Unit, which uses state and federal data to flag potential violations. The cases flagged Tuesday include 11 potential instances of double-voting across multiple states, and 30 potential noncitizen voter registrations in Ohio, according to LaRose’s office.

“We must send a clear message that election fraud won’t be tolerated,” LaRose said in a statement. “The only way to maintain Ohio’s high standard of election integrity is to enforce the law whenever it’s broken.”

LaRose’s office has previously referred hundreds of potential voter fraud cases, though conviction rates have remained very low. As of September 2024, only 12 of more than 600 cases LaRose has referred to county prosecutors since taking office in 2019 have resulted in criminal charges. That’s an infinitesimal fraction of the tens of millions of votes cast during that time period. For example, in the November 2024 general election alone, more than 5 million Ohioans cast ballots.

Despite claims from members of the Republican Party that voting by noncitizens is widespread, research has found that their participation in state and federal elections is vanishingly rare. Many suspected noncitizen voting cases involve administrative errors, such as individuals who became naturalized citizens after registering but before voting, or database matching errors. Experts have also previously explained that language barriers for noncitizens can explain how someone may unintentionally vote illegally.

However, in his letter to Yost, LaRose said that even small numbers of fraudulent votes can impact election outcomes.

“Critics of Ohio’s election integrity efforts may try to minimize the significance of these referrals, as though some small amount of election crime is acceptable,” LaRose wrote. “Even one illegal vote can spoil the outcome of an election for the citizenry at large.

The Election Integrity Unit operates within LaRose’s Public Integrity Division, created in 2022 to consolidate investigative functions including campaign finance reporting, voting system certification, voter registration integrity, the investigation of election law violations, data retention & transparency, and cybersecurity protocols. The Ohio General Assembly is considering legislation to make the unit permanent, as it currently operates under LaRose’s administrative authority.

Ohio law empowers LaRose to investigate these cases but not prosecute them. The referred cases now await review by the respective attorneys general, who will determine whether to pursue criminal charges.

Note: Generative AI was used to organize information for this story, based on data provided by Ohio Secretary of State.