Ohio launches effort to clean up voter rolls ahead of November’s presidential election

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Ohio’s Republican Secretary of State Frank LaRose directed county election directors on Thursday to begin a “routine but enhanced” hunt through the voter rolls ahead of November’s election, in an effort he says is legally mandated to remove inactive registrations.

“Every state is required to have an ongoing process to verify the accuracy of its voter rolls, but Ohio has the most advanced and effective protocols in the nation,” LaRose said in announcing the directive. “This work is not only critical to keeping our elections honest, but it’s also essential to making sure our election officials can properly plan for the right number of ballots, voting machines, polling places and poll workers.”

The list maintenance effort will target four specific areas:

All registrations deemed inactive and so legally qualified for removal will be listed for public review on a Registration Readiness roster posted for public review to the Ohio Secretary of State’s website. This provides one final opportunity for individual voters and voting rights groups to keep a registration from being deleted.