October 20, 2004

Missouri's Mega Voter Rolls

Colorado isn't the only state with weird voter registration numbers:

A record 4.2 million Missourians are registered to vote on Nov. 2 — a figure so high that election officials acknowledge it likely is inflated by a large number of people who are registered more than once.
Statewide, there were fewer than 4.3 million voting-age residents, according to the most recent Census Bureau estimate. If Missouri's voter rolls were accurate, that would mean 98 percent of adults are registered to vote.

"We've wondered if there's anyone left in the state who is not registered," Betsy Byers, an election director for Secretary of State Matt Blunt, said Tuesday.

"It's inflated somewhat," she added, "but I don't know what to tell you as far as how much."

The inflated voter rolls could allow some people to illegally vote twice, Byers acknowledged. Yet a more likely outcome, she said, is that many of the duplicative registrants will vote only once or not at all — and Missouri's voter turnout will appear lower than reality.

Missouri has no way of automatically updating its central voter registration database when a resident moves to another city, county or state. And under federal law, it can take more than four years to remove a voter whose address cannot be verified.

The result is that in 36 of Missouri's 114 counties, and in the city of St. Louis, more voters are registered for the November elections than there were residents age 18 and older in the July 2003 Census Bureau estimate, according to an analysis by The Associated Press.