COLUMBUS, Ohio — Advocates for individuals experiencing homelessness are asking Ohio not to move forward with their scheduled voter purge before the November election.
About 160,000 Ohioans are about to lose their ability to vote on July 22, 2024. This elimination should only impact inactive and infrequent voters, but voting rights advocates say they only have two weeks to fix a civil rights issue.
"The system that the state of Ohio currently has for voters is systematically disenfranchising our most vulnerable people," said Cid Standifer with the Northeast Ohio Voter Advocates (NOVA).
NOVA highlighted 500 registered voters who are set to be removed. What they all have in common — the voters are all unhoused and registered to vote at shelters in Cleveland.
Lutheran Metropolitan Ministries runs one of, if not the largest, men's shelters at 2100 Lakeside Ave. Nearly 400 people registered at that address will be purged.
The Cuyahoga County Board of Elections (CCBOE) told me they put more than 130 people on the purge list because the mail that was sent to the shelters to confirm the voter lived there was returned “undeliverable” or the board didn’t get a response. More than 250 others had voter information that "didn't match BMV records."
It is unclear what information didn't match state records since boards don't need to report that. BOE Director Tony Perlatti said he would get that information for me.
"The state of Ohio says this is how homeless people can vote," Standifer said. "They can use a homeless shelter or a service center address where they'll accept mail."
The purge impacts Ohioans of all income levels. If you change your mailing address, don't vote for four years and don’t respond to letters from your BOE, your voter status could be canceled. Even if you don’t move but don't vote for six years, you could also be eliminated.
While purges are controversial, Case Western Reserve University elections law professor Atiba Ellis says they have a purpose.
"States have a large degree of discretion in terms of how they run elections and how they run voter registration and maintaining voter lists in particular," Ellis said.
This practice was challenged in court, with the ACLU of Ohio and others suing that the list-maintenance process violated the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA) and the Help America Vote Act of 2002. NVRA forbids voter removal if the sole reason is for failure to vote.
The U.S. Supreme Court in 2018 ruled in a 5-4 decision that although Ohio does purge infrequent voters from the registration rolls, its mailing process is sufficient grounds to get rid of the individual.
"Federal law tends to require that states make — what basically is a good faith effort in terms of maintaining accurate lists," the professor added. "If your database becomes too big, it becomes difficult to manage."
Perlatti told me that they aren’t trying to remove any legitimate voter or disenfranchise individuals facing homelessness but say they are bound by law to follow this process.
"We definitely don't wanna promote that [disenfranchisement], but at the same time, everyone needs to have a registration address so we're able to precinct them and know which ballot to give them," the director said. "If they move to a different shelter or what it may be, we want to make sure that they get registered there."
There is at least one person who lives at a shelter who registered to vote in 2024, yet they are still on the purge list. Perlatti said he would check on the reasoning for this.
Still, Standifer wants to know how to fix this problem since voting is a civil right.
"Where do we go to find these people and let them know that they're on the purge list?" Standifer asked incredulously.
Perlatti told me that this news story will hopefully help get the word out there so that people know they are on the purge list. Also, so shelter officials can alert their clients.
"We should eliminate the voter purge process," Standifer said. "It takes people with messy lives — in difficult situations — and it takes them off the rolls."
We reached out to Sec. of State Frank LaRose about this dilemma and if there were ways to help unhoused individuals better, but did not hear back.
How to find out if you are about to be purged
The full list of about-to-be canceled registrations can be viewed at the SOS's Registration Readiness website, which is available here.
If you find out you are on the list, you will need to update your voter registration, which can be done here. You can also go to the local BOE or give them a call to ask about your status.
If you aren't on the purge list but haven't voted in a while, check this SOS page to look up if you are still registered.
Luckily, you can re-register to vote even after you've been purged and still be able to vote in the presidential race. The purge is on July 22, and the deadline to register to vote is Oct. 7.
The fight against purges
LaRose is supposed to put out a list of everyone he is removing from the rolls before the voter registration deadline, which he did this year. However, he didn't last year.
LaRose originally planned to remove about 140,000 names, but around 16,000 voters were mislabeled, according to Democrats. And this isn't the first time.
Back in 2019, the secretary spoke to News 5 about the challenges that came from the last voter sweep.
"Over 10,000 voters have said 'no I still want to be a registered voter in Ohio' and so they've taken action, they've gone on our website or filled out the form and sent it in," LaRose said at the time.
That list ended up gaining 30,000 additional voters, according to a New York Times report.
A review of the work of one vendor found that more than 1,400 names were incorrectly added to the list, sparking calls from the League of Women Voters and other groups to delay the 2019 removal. Numerous activist groups have reached out to News 5 to assert initial concerns with this list, arguing about inaccurate names.
"It should not be [voters'] job to not be removed," state Rep. Bride Sweeney (D-Cleveland) told me last year. "It's our job not to arbitrarily remove people who've done the work of registering themselves in the state."
The state isn't trying to remove any legitimate voter, LaRose has said, but undergoing this process keeps Ohio elections safe.
To be explicitly clear, there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in Ohio. One of the few cases ever resulting in a conviction was a Republican attorney from Cleveland who voted twice in the 2020 and 2022 elections.
If you believe you or a loved one has been wrongfully added to the voter purge list, please email Statehouse reporter Morgan Trau at Morgan.Trau@wews.com with the subject line 'VOTER PURGE.'
Follow WEWS statehouse reporter Morgan Trau on Twitter and Facebook.
