The law requiring Virginia's Department of Motor Vehicles to produce a list of suspected noncitizens to strike from the roll of eligible voters was signed by then Governor Tim Kaine almost 20 years ago.
2006 was Governor Tim Kaine's first General Assembly session in the Executive Mansion, and at the time lawmakers were focused on a budget battle and a transportation package. But there was one bill also on the agenda that required the DMV to produce a list of people who should be stricken from the list of eligible voters.
One of the Democrats who voted against that bill was Senator Creigh Deeds of Charlottesville, who says it was a reaction to the Motor Voter Law.
"And it basically went a step further and said if they’re going to register people to vote, they also have to determine whether they are citizens or not," Deeds says. "Well, who can object to that? Well, in my view, you were bringing DMV into something that they weren't really designed to do. They aren’t designed to make those determinations."
The bill was introduced by Ken Cuccinelli, who was a Republican senator from Fairfax County at the time. He's now chairman of the Election Transparency Initiative – and he acknowledges this process does end up striking some citizens from the rolls temporarily.
"There's no arrangement that's ever perfect. But this information originates with the voter," Cuccinelli says. "So that's part of why DMV doesn't just do this automatically. It goes to the registrar, who then communicates with the voter."
Cuccinelli’s bill was signed by Kaine, and the DMV list has been used to conduct monthly purges of the voter rolls ever since – including monthly purges when Democrats were in power.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.
