Texas Identifies 2,724 Potential Noncitizens on Rolls

Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson announced that a full comparison of the state's roughly 18 million voter registrations with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services' SAVE database identified 2,724 potential noncitizens on the rolls. Flagged records were sent to counties, which must notify each individual and give them 30 days to prove U.S. citizenship before a registration can be canceled; counties will investigate and confirmed noncitizen voters may be referred to the state attorney general. Nelson credited the Trump administration's decision to grant states free, direct access to SAVE as a “game changer” for maintaining accurate voter lists. Observers and reporting note the crosscheck can produce false positives — for example, naturalized citizens still appearing in SAVE as noncitizens — and raises privacy and legal concerns given past challenges to merging immigration and voter data. The announcement came as early voting began in Texas and amid partisan disputes over federal and state efforts, including the SAVE Act, to remove noncitizens from voter rolls, with Democrats warning such measures can be restrictive. Texas voters will also decide on Proposition 16 in November, a proposed constitutional amendment to explicitly prohibit noncitizens from voting in state elections.