Los Angeles Times
California’s ambitious effort to automate voter registration at Department of Motor Vehicle offices produced almost 84,000 duplicate records and more than twice that number with political party mistakes, according to an audit released Friday by state officials.
The analysis covered just the first five months of the new “motor voter” program, which was launched in April 2018. It found a wide array of problems with the rollout of the DMV system, including a limited amount of testing as well as inconsistent and confusing lines of communication between the state agencies involved in its creation. Many of the findings align with documents reported by the Los Angeles Times in an investigation earlier this year of the motor voter program.
Auditors reviewed more than 3 million voter registration files, comparing the records from both DMV and California’s secretary of state. They found 83,684 duplicate voter registration records, a mistake attributed to inconsistencies in what was listed for voters’ political party preferences.
“This action resulted in no impact to voter eligibility,” Keely Martin Bosler, director of the state Department of Finance, wrote in a letter on Friday to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Cabinet secretary.
