North Carolina's "No Match No Register" Rule

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

A bill for Day Registration has been introduced at the NC legislature,
but it still leaves unsolved a terrible problem:

~ North Carolina's "No Match No Register" Rule ~

As long as North Carolina has its "no match no register rule,
Same Day Registration won't be able to meet up to its full potential -
many voters will not be able to register.

This past November, provisional ballots accounted for 4.55% of all ballots cast.
Of that number, about 40% were discarded.

We must address this problem in tandem with implementing Same Day Registration.

Same Day Registration will reduce the number of provisional ballots, but it
will not protect those voters who are blocked by NC's "no match no register" rule.

Lower down the page I cite data of voter registrations which were rejected because of failure to
match our DMV or SS database.

Justin Levitt, Brennan Center for Justice advises that:

"North Carolina's procedures * as we understand them *
will predictably keep eligible citizens from voting, in a way that is contrary to federal law ...
a nd that is why we remain concerned."

If I understand correctly, North Carolina attempts to match information on registration forms to
that on the DMV or Social Security databases.

-Voters who submit a Social Security number on their registration forms will not be registered
if the information doesn't match exactly.

-Voters who submit a driver's license number that doesn't match a number on the DMV list
will not be registered.

-Voters who submit a driver's license number with information that doesn't match exactly
will be labeled "review", but they will not be registered unless the county board of elections approves it.

Washington State used to have the same or similar "no match no vote" registration rule, until
a court ruling in August of 2006.
http://www.brennancenter.org/stack_detail.asp?key=102&subkey=36414
and
http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/electionlaw/litigation/wac.php

Don Wright advises that the NC SBOE is waiting to see if the Washington State decision is overturned.

In correspondence between the North Carolina State Board of Elections and Jo-Anne Chasnow of Project Vote, the SBOE discusses that.
http://www.ncvoter.net/downloads/Washington_StateRuling_E-mail.pdf

Our State Board of Elections advises that:
"Section 303 of HAVA mandates the matching and interfacing with DMV and the SSA."

THE BRENNAN CENTER DISAGREES

I believe that this "no match - no register" rule leads to a higher rate of provisional ballots cast,
and a higher rate of provisional ballots rejected.

This November, statewide, provisional ballots accounted for about 4.55% of all ballots cast.
About 60% of all provisionals in the state were counted.

NC's Voter Registration Database connects to the Dept of Motor Vehicles and the
Social Security Database.
Matches of Drivers license numbers (most commonly used) had a 98.25 % valid rate of return,
Matches against the Social Security Database had only about an 80 % valid rate of return.

Data on Provisional Ballots in North Carolina:

Nov 2006
Total voter turnout
2,036,451

Total number of provisional voters
92,621
4.55 % of total turnout

Total provisional ballots counted
55,775
60% of provisionals counted
2.74% of total turnout

Vote Not Counted
30,307
40 % of provisionals not counted
1.49 % of total turnout

Vote Partially Counted
6,403
.31 % of total turnout
http://www.ncvoter.net/downloads/Provisional_Stats_Nov2006pdf.pdf


County DMV Validation Count 169673
DMV Returned Valid 166703
Percent Valid Return 98.25%

County SSN Validation Count 61337
SSN Returned Valid 48693
Percent Valid Return 79.39%
Percent Not Valid 20.61%

*** These are numbers for 2006 and the DMV valid returns have a +/-3% error variance due
to the fact that there is further logic to define a dmv valid match based on name and birth date.

http://www.ncvoter.net/downloads/dmv_ssn_validation_counts.xls