GOP leaders in N.J. pounce on voter registration glitch, blame Democrats

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Republican state Sen. Joseph Pennacchio, R-Morris, is formally requesting the U.S. Department of Justice to immediately launch an investigation into the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission’s automatic voter registration system.

The request comes after Gov. Mikie Sherrill announced Tuesday that a glitch in the MVC system in 2023 improperly registered about 6,600 noncitizens to vote, and nearly 400 ballots were illegally cast.

In a letter to Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche, Pennacchio expressed concern about the transparency of the investigation ordered by Sherrill, and asked for federal help.

Republicans pounce

Other GOP leaders have been quick to pounce on the issue as well. Hours after Sherrill’s news conference, Republican Senate leader Tony Bucco, R-Morris, issued a statement claiming that members of his party warned Democrats about allowing undocumented immigrants to get driver’s licenses.

State Sen. Declan O’Scanlon, R-Monmouth, who is considered a possible Republican gubernatorial candidate in 2029, issued a statement calling the situation “shocking” and “outrageous.” He said every voter registration processed through the MVC over the last decade should be reviewed.

Assembly Republican Leader John DiMaio, R-Somerset, issued a release accusing Democrats of undermining public trust in elections, and calling for a full audit of New Jersey’s voter rolls.

State Sen. Kristin Corrado, R-Bergen, who serves on the Judiciary Committee, issued a statement saying she had warned for years that New Jersey needed stronger election safeguards, but her warnings had been ignored.

Micah Rasmussen, director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University, said the Republican response to the voter registration snafu is not surprising.

“A lot of these Republican legislators have raised these concerns all along,” he said. “It’s fair that now they are saying ‘We told you so.’”

Mistakes happen

He said at the same time it’s important to remember that New Jersey is not the first state to discover that a small number of noncitizens had improperly been registered to vote.

“Red states have certainly found noncitizens to be voting, Georgia found 139 votes, Ohio had 138 votes, Iowa had 35 votes cast by noncitizens,” he said. “That does not mean we should tolerate or accept errors, we have to find them and fix them, but New Jersey is certainly not the only state that has found itself in this situation.”

During NPR’s “Morning Edition,” David Becker, who leads the nonpartisan Center for Election Innovation & Research, was asked how significant it is that 6,600 noncitizens were improperly registered to vote, and about 400 of them wound up voting in a New Jersey election.

He said the technical glitch should not have happened, but “6,600 out of the entire New Jersey population is still only 0.1% of the entire voter registration list, and the 400 individuals who voted was 0.009% of the number of people who voted, for instance, in 2024 in New Jersey.”

Will the issue help Republicans?

Democrats have controlled the General Assembly and state Senate since 2002, and Rasmussen said Republican legislative candidates will certainly remind voters about the voter registration glitch during their 2027 election campaigns.

“This is likely to be a popular issue that resonates, and the position that Republicans are taking is a popular one,” he said. “This is one that definitely Republicans can legitimately say, ‘I told you so.’ They will score some points with some voters.”

He said it remains to be seen how much weight voters place on the issue, compared to the cost of gas, food, housing and energy prices.

Democratic legislative leaders issued statements praising Sherrill for her transparency and swift action to address the voter registration errors.

“The integrity of our elections is a responsibility we all share, which is why I commend the Governor and the administration for being forthright with the people of New Jersey about this error, and for taking the immediate step to hire a respected independent law firm to investigate and provide recommendations on how to prevent an error like this from ever happening again,” said Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin, D-Middlesex, in a statement.

“A healthy democracy depends on the security of our voter registration systems and the stewardship of the individuals entrusted with ensuring our elections are free, fair, and accessible,” said Senate President Nick Scutari, D-Union, in a statement. “It also depends on public trust, and Governor Sherrill deserves credit for being transparent about these failures, taking swift action to launch an independent investigation of what went wrong, and pledging to hold anyone responsible to account. Once the independent investigation is complete, the Senate will review its findings and identify any necessary next steps.”