Justice Dept. sues to clean North Carolina's voting rolls

The Trump Justice Department announced a lawsuit Tuesday against North Carolina, challenging the state to clean up its voter rolls and remove names of people who didn’t provide all the information required to register to vote.

Federal lawyers said the law requires states to collect at least a partial Social Security number or driver’s license number from those signing up to vote.

But North Carolina’s registration form doesn’t explicitly ask for either of those pieces of information, the Justice Department said.

It said a “significant number” of people on the state rolls were added without providing that information, and when the issue was raised, the state took “limited actions” to fix things.

The Justice Department asked a judge to order the state to use a registration form that complies with the law and to contact everyone added to the lists without the proper information.

“Accurate voter registration rolls are critical to ensure that elections in North Carolina are conducted fairly, accurately, and without fraud,” said Harmeet K. Dhillon, assistant attorney general at the civil rights division.

Sam Hayes, executive director of North Carolina’s State Board of Elections, acknowledged the state’s “well-documented” failure to collect the information required by federal law.

“Rest assured that I am committed to bringing North Carolina into compliance with federal law,” he said.