Should it be a crime for parolees to cast ballot?

GRAHAM, N.C. — Keith Sellars and his daughters were driving home from dinner at a Mexican restaurant in December when he was pulled over for going through a red light. The police officer ran a background check and came back with bad news for Sellars. There was a warrant out for his arrest.

As his girls cried in the back seat, Sellars was handcuffed and taken to jail. His crime: Illegal voting. “I didn’t know,” said Sellars, who spent the night in jail until his family paid his $2,500 bond. “I thought I was practicing my right.”

Sellars, 44, is one of a dozen people in Alamance County in North Carolina who have been charged with voting illegally in the 2016 presidential election. All were on probation or parole for felony convictions, which in North Carolina and many other states disqualifies a person from voting. If convicted, they could face up to two years in prison.

Though elections experts and public officials across the country say there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud, local prosecutors and state officials in North Carolina, Texas, Kansas, Idaho and other states have sought to send a tough message by filing criminal charges against the tiny fraction of people who are caught voting illegally.

The cases are rare compared with the tens of millions of votes cast in state and national elections. In 2017, at least 11 people nationwide were convicted of illegal voting because they were felons or non-citizens, according to a database of voting prosecutions compiled by the conservative Heritage Foundation. Others have been convicted of voting twice, filing false registrations or casting a ballot for a family member.

The case against the 12 voters in Alamance County