Ohio identifies 597 noncitizens who voted or registered in recent elections

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio’s elections director on Wednesday nominated for possible prosecution 597 apparent noncitizens who registered to vote or cast ballots in a recent election, a higher number than he normally sees but still a small fraction of the state’s electorate.

Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose said of those cases, 138 were registered voters and 459 were registered but did not vote. They were identified as part of a routine review and referred to Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost.

The total is in stark contrast to the 148 cases referred by non-citizens in 2022, 117 in 2021 and 354 in 2019. More than 8 million people are registered to vote in Ohio.

Only a handful of non-citizen cases are ever prosecuted. This year’s referrals, however, come as non-citizen voting is prevented a central part of the Republicans’ 2024 campaign message.

Earlier this year, LaRose launched an audit of the state’s voter registration database that resulted in the removal of 154,995 registrations which he said had been confirmed to have been abandoned and inactive for at least four consecutive years.

Civil rights groups criticized the effort as voter suppression. LaRose said the effort is ongoing and that additional cancellations could occur before the November presidential election.

LaRose has said his citizenship verification efforts this year are the most comprehensive the office has ever undertaken. The analysis includes cross-checks against data from the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles, the Department of Homeland Security’s federal noncitizen database, the Social Security Administration, federal jury pool data and other sources.