Warning of Brooklyn Voter Purge Dates Back Weeks
When WNYC first asked the city Board of Elections on April 17th why there was such a large drop in active Democrats on the rolls — especially in Brooklyn — BOE Executive Director Michael Ryan was stumped.
“I can't speak to precisely what happened in Brooklyn, you know, during this conversation. It's certainly something I can look into and follow up on," Ryan told WNYC.
The next day, Ryan came back with more information: 126,000 Brooklyn voters had been removed from the active rolls from last fall through April, more than double the initial estimate.
But it turns out, a unit of the City's Campaign Finance Board, which works with the Board of Elections on voter turnout issues, had already been asking about missing voters in early March.
“This started for us when a couple members of our staff actually got this notice from the Board of Elections saying that they had been moved from active to inactive status,” said Eric Friedman, Assistant Executive Director for Public Affairs at the New York City Campaign Finance Board.
Friedman said a CFB staff member and a relative received notices from the Board of Elections in February. They hadn't moved, they were regular voters and they were confused about why their voter status was being changed.
The CFB said it went back and forth with the Board of Elections. Details of the CFB's inquiry are included in its annual Voter Assistance Unit Report released on Friday.
Even if the Board of Elections process to maintain its voter rolls is legal, Friedman stressed voters don't trust it.
“What we saw at the primary is the law isn't working for voters,” he said.
On Tuesday, the CFB will be in Albany lobbying for the Voter Empowerment Act, which would create a statewide online voter registration system and eliminate the current paper-based, error-prone one.
The city Board of Elections has not yet responded to a request for comment.
Investigations into the agency's operations by the city Comptroller and State Attorney General are ongoing.
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