How many foreign citizens voted in Pa. elections? Ask Al Schmidt
In 2017, former Secretary of State Robert Torres delivered shocking news: foreign nationals had been voting in Commonwealth elections for decades. This revelation came as no surprise to Al Schmidt, who was then a member of the Philadelphia city commissioners, a board of officials who oversee elections and voter registration.
In October 2017, Schmidt testified before the Pennsylvania House’s state government committee that his independent investigation uncovered hundreds of votes by foreign nationals in Philly elections since 2006.
That was just the beginning. In December 2017, he testified to the Pennsylvania senate’s state government and transportation committees that he was briefed by State Department officials on a department study that identified more than 100,000 registered voters who may lack U.S. citizenship.
Schmidt demanded action. He called on the department to release the details of this finding to county election boards so they could start the delicate cleanup work. He also asked officials to give these registered aliens a chance to cancel their voter registrations before the 2018 Midterms. According to state department records, suspected aliens received letters reminding them of the voter eligibility requirements in May and June 2018.
Schmidt knows alien voting is not a victimless act. Most understand that an invalid vote cancels out a valid vote. But many miss that voting by foreign nationals can derail their naturalization process and end in deportation. Schmidt understood all of the stakes. During his testimony, Schmidt showcased a letter from a former green card holder who was deported without his family because he voted.
Before you presume the alien resident got his comeuppance, consider this: many aliens become registered because PennDOT asked them to during the driver licensing process even though a government agency should not offer that opportunity to aliens. Additionally, sometimes the paperwork or computer screens display a language or terms that the alien does not fully understand.
Think about your last trip to PennDOT. Did you read everything you signed?
Like Commissioner Schmidt, the Public Interest Legal Foundation thought the public deserved answers. The Foundation asked the State Department to show their work, particularly the study identifying the 100,000 potential foreign nationals. When Secretary Torres refused the request, the Foundation sued in federal court.
In 2022, a federal district court judge in Harrisburg sided with the Foundation, ruling that the State Department cannot arbitrarily hide alien voting records from the public.
Along the way, the Foundation learned that the State Department hired an outside “expert” to determine how many aliens may be registered to vote. Who was this expert? What makes someone an expert in determining who is an alien? The answer remains a closely guarded state secret. How did the secret expert identify aliens on the voter rolls?
Their methodology is double-secret. In fact, the State Department even refused a request for methodology details from the Commonwealth’s Auditor General, according to a December 2019 report.
Due to the lawsuit, we now know the number of suspected aliens identified by the mystery expert was far fewer than the 100,000 figure Al Schmidt revealed in 2017. Election officials ultimately suspected 11,000 Pennsylvania voters could be foreigners, as of that time. In May and June 2018, those people received letters asking them to cancel their registration records or confirm their U.S. citizenship.
Pennsylvania’s answer to two decades of documented alien voting was to write letters and hope for the best.
State records show that 17 percent of the 11,000 letters went to undeliverable addresses. A whopping 60 percent were simply ignored. Only 215 recipients wrote back, confirming they were not U.S. citizens. Given the legal consequences for all involved, do you think this sounds like ‘mission accomplished’ in a genuine sense?
How did we get from 100,000 suspected aliens to just 215 cancellations? What happened to the other 89,000 suspected alien registrants? Who was this secret expert paid with tax dollars to diagnose a decades-long problem? Are immigrants in Pennsylvania protected from exposure to voting systems today? These are not classified matters.
Nor should they be. We do not even know if or how the commonwealth continues to take action regarding aliens on the voter roll because the department of state refuses to reveal its methodology. Haven’t we learned over the last few years that the last thing we need is a government that operates in secrecy?
In 2017, Al Schmidt demanded action and transparency from the State Department. As secretary, he is now in a position to meet his own demands.
Your move, Secretary.