Federal appeals court upholds Michigan's process of removing dead people from voter rolls
A federal appeals panel has upheld Michigan’s process for removing deceased voters from the voting rolls.
In a decision released Tuesday, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied an appeal of a lower court’s dismissal of a lawsuit by the Public Interest Legal Foundation, a conservative group that has filed legal challenges across the U.S. seeking to remove people from voter rolls.
“I’m very grateful that a federal court has once again recognized our strong work keeping our voter file up to date,” Benson said in a press release. “Since 2020, our department has fought a record number of lawsuits based on false and meritless claims meant to undermine people’s faith in Michigan’s elections.”
Public Interest Legal Foundation filed the lawsuit against Benson, a Democrat who is also a candidate for governor, in November 2021, alleging Michigan was violating the National Voter Registration Act by refusing to remove 27,000 individuals from its qualified voter file the group said were dead.
Lawyers for Benson’s office had argued that she declined to remove the voters because doing so without confirming the accuracy of the group’s list would have risked removing eligible voters in violation of federal voting law, which seeks to ensure voters aren’t wrongly removed.
https://michiganadvance.com/briefs/federal-appeals-court-upholds-michigans-process-of-removing-dead-people-from-voter-rolls/