Two Tennessee lawmakers are calling for an investigation after the state coordinator of elections sent out over 14,000 letters asking voters for proof of their citizenship before the upcoming election. This comes just weeks before early voting starts for the primaries. Via WKRN.com:
The letter was sent a select group of Tennesseans from the state coordinator of elections, Mark Goins. The letter reads that their voter information matches with an individual who may have not been a U.S. citizen at the time they got their driver license or ID card.
“On its face, this letter is voter intimidation,” State Rep. John Ray Clemmons (D-Nashville) said. The letter then asks for the voter to send back proof of their citizenship, such as their birth certificate or U.S. passport. “It gives the impression—falsely—that there is another procedural step that they must jump through before they can vote in the upcoming elections,” Clemmons said.
Clemmons said a select group of voters both here in Nashville and across the state have received this letter. “One from whom we heard became a U.S. citizen in 2006, and they received this letter. They are pulling this information for somewhere,” Clemmons said. That is the representative’s biggest question, as he now calls on the Tennessee Attorney General to investigate why these voters were targeted.
Sigh. This kind of illegal shenanigans is why it is so important to check your voter status before the general election. Republicans are going to pull every trick in the book.
“At its core it is voter intimidation,” said Tennessee state Rep. Gloria Johnson, who’s running for U.S. Senate. Johnson told Democracy Docket that one of her constituents received a notice even though he became a U.S. citizen in 2022.
The Knoxville Democrat also questioned whether it was lawful for Goins’s office to send the letters. Tennessee law requires the elections coordinator to compare the statewide voter registration database with the Department of Safety database to ensure noncitizens aren’t registered to vote.
But if there’s evidence that a registered voter isn’t a U.S. citizen, the law requires the elections coordinator to notify the county election commission where the person registered to vote, and the commission must then alert the registered voter. “He has no power to notify the citizens themselves,” Johnson said.
Goins has not responded to Democracy Docket’s request for an interview.
On Monday, Tennessee House Minority Leader Karen Camper sent a letter to Secretary of State Tre Hargett’s office about the notice, seeking clarification on the legal basis for the notice and what the secretary of state’s office plans to do with the identifying information submitted from people confirming their citizenship.
