LANSING, Mich. (WZMQ) – Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson on Thursday pushed back against allegations from Macomb County Clerk Anthony Forlini that non-U.S. citizens are registered and voting in Michigan elections.
Forlini said his office identified 239 non-citizens in a jury pool for the 16th Judicial Circuit Court on Jan. 13. The jury pool was created using the Secretary of State’s driver’s license database, which includes non-citizens who are legally eligible for driver’s licenses but ineligible for jury duty.
After cross-checking those names with the state’s Qualified Voter File, Forlini said 15 people had been registered to vote at some point.
Forlini, a Republican who is running for secretary of state, has called for improved data-sharing between state databases to flag citizenship status. Election expert David Becker said using jury duty records to identify voter fraud often results in false positives and risks disenfranchising eligible voters.
Benson said a review by the Michigan Bureau of Elections found a more limited scope. According to the Michigan Department of State, only three of the 15 individuals had any voting history.
“What we found was that only three of the 15 people referred had any voting history at all, and one was an American citizen who had legally cast their ballot,” Benson said.
State officials say one of the three was an apparent non-citizen who last voted in 2018 and whose voter registration was canceled in 2022. A third individual, who voted in 2024, remains under investigation as officials seek additional documentation to verify citizenship status.
MDOS says three of the 15 are confirmed U.S. citizens and eligible voters, four are apparent non-citizens, four registrations had already been canceled, and four cases require further verification. Letters are being sent to some individuals to confirm eligibility, with registrations subject to cancellation if no response is received.
“When we review our voter lists, it is not uncommon to find eligible American voters improperly labeled as non-citizens, whether by clerical error, change of citizenship status, or otherwise. We update our lists accordingly so that eligible citizens aren’t wrongfully investigated, removed from voter rolls, or stopped from voting.” Benson said, “In my administration, as Secretary of State, we have removed more than 1.1 million out-of-date registrations from our voter rolls that we have done legally and carefully to ensure that every eligible citizen is able to vote.”
Benson warned that premature accusations can have serious consequences.
“Reckless accusations without careful investigations put American citizens under the threat of arrest and criminal inquiry, even though they have done nothing wrong,” she said.
