Texas resigns from national voter fraud prevention program

TEXAS (CBSNewsTexas.com) – Texas officially resigned from the national coalition that helps prevent voter fraud on Thursday.

The multistate voter registration program, Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), is used for checking duplicate voter registrations and cleaning voter rolls.

The bill, authored by state Sen. Bryan Hughes, passed at the end of May. 

Thursday, the Secretary of State, Jane Nelson, sent a letter to ERIC resigning from the program.

ERIC is considered by election administration experts across the country to be the best tool for preventing double voting across state lines but has been a target of viral conspiracy theories spread since early  2022 by conservative publications. 

According to the non-profit’s website, ERIC was formed by a bipartisan group of chief election officials from seven states formed ERIC in 2012, with assistance from The Pew Charitable Trusts to address keeping voter rolls up to date. These seven states were Colorado, Delaware, Maryland, Nevada, Utah, Virginia, and Washington.    

According to recent polling conducted by Chris Perkins of Ragnar Research Partners on behalf of Secure Democracy Foundation and Secure Democracy USA, 84% of Texas Republican voters support the state’s continued use of ERIC to help maintain clean voter rolls.      

In response to the state’s resignation letter, ERIC’s Executive Director, Shane Hamlin, issued the following statement to CBSNewsTexas:

“ERIC will follow our Bylaws and Membership Agreement regarding any member’s request to resign membership. We will continue our work on behalf of our remaining member states in improving the accuracy of America’s voter rolls and increasing access to voter registration for all eligible citizens.”

Most states are required by the federal National Voter Registration Act to “conduct a general program that makes a reasonable effort to remove the names of ineligible voters” from the rolls. States not subject to this federal law have state “list maintenance” laws aimed at keeping voter records up to date.     

Texas law requires the state to participate in a multistate data-sharing program to clean its voter rolls.

Now, according to the bill, the secretary of state is charged with building its own version of a multistate cross-check program or finding a “private sector provider” without exceeding a cost of $100,000, effective Sept. 1, 2023.

According to the Secretary’s letter, Texas’ relationship with ERIC will end Oct. 19, 2023.