New York University Law School's Brennan Center for Justice has released a new report on voter registration purges that shows a sharp uptick in the number of purged registrations in states with a history of racial discrimination since 2013, when the Supreme Court gutted a key part of the Voting Rights Act. That provision of the VRA had required such states to obtain Justice Department approval whenever they enacted changes to voting practices, including purges, in order to ensure they would not harm the rights of minorities. Its removal has allowed these jurisdictions, which are mostly Republican-run, to more aggressively purge their voter rolls.
Overall, the Brennan report finds that 33 percent more voters were purged between 2014 and 2016 than were purged between 2006 and 2008, and in some states, the rate of increase was dramatically higher. For instance, once freed from Justice Department scrutiny, Georgia Republicans purged twice as many voters between the 2012 and 2016 elections as they did between 2008 and 2012. The report estimates that, nationwide, 2 million fewer voters would have been purged between 2012 and 2016 if states previously subject to federal oversight had pruned their voter rolls at the same rate as the other states.
Election officials of course need to take steps to maintain accurate voter registration rolls and remove people who have moved away or died, but some of these hyper-aggressive purges have taken people off the rolls simply for not voting, and the Brennan report cites numerous examples where purges have incorrectly removed eligible voters. Wrongful purges like these can leave voters with no recourse if they show up on Election Day and aren't on the voter rolls, and that’s exactly the idea for Republicans, since infrequent voters—that is, the type most likely to be vulnerable to improper purges—tend to lean toward Democrats.
Last month, the Supreme Court further exacerbated the problem when it upheld Ohio Republicans' aggressive purging of their state’s voter rolls, giving the green light to further such efforts. But voting rights advocates can fight back by enacting policies like automatic voter registration that both expand the franchise and help keep voter registries accurate and up-to-date.