TRENTON, N.J., Aug. 28 (Nationwide Times) — The Republican National Committee has put New Jersey’s secretary of state and election officials in six counties on notice: produce records about voter-roll maintenance and citizenship checks by Sept. 15 or potentially face a lawsuit.
The notices concern Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Middlesex, Somerset and Union counties, as well as Secretary of State Tahesha Way. The RNC says it is seeking records about the removal of noncitizens from voter rolls, efforts to verify citizenship and other procedures required under the National Voter Registration Act.
The dispute comes after New Jersey officials disclosed that a software error at the state Motor Vehicle Commission sent information for about 6,600 people to the Division of Elections between June 2023 and June 2024, even though the people had indicated they were not U.S. citizens.
What is the RNC asking for?
The RNC says the records will show how noncitizens came to appear on the rolls and how state and county officials responded. The National Voter Registration Act, or NVRA, requires states to maintain accurate voter-registration lists while also limiting improper removals of eligible voters.
The RNC said the officials must provide the requested information by Sept. 15. It warned that failure to do so could lead to litigation.
“Voters deserve answers, and the RNC is putting officials on notice: comply with the law, hand over the records, or face legal action,” the organization said in a statement described in the notices.
The RNC has already pursued records from New Jersey. In 2025, it filed a lawsuit in Mercer County Superior Court seeking documents about voter-roll maintenance and related records.
What happened with the MVC software error?
New Jersey officials said the MVC system transmitted information for people who had indicated they were not U.S. citizens. The state said about 5,100 registrations were later placed in deleted status because there was no other registration, attestation or transaction showing that the individuals were eligible.
Another roughly 1,450 registrations were marked rejected while county election officials reviewed additional records. Those people cannot vote unless their eligibility is verified, according to the state’s account.
The House Judiciary Committee said the registration issue ended after the MVC asked technology contractor IDEMIA to change software settings in June 2024. The committee also said the affected registrations were not immediately removed and that the issue was not publicly disclosed until later.
The available information does not establish how many, if any, of the affected people cast ballots illegally. Federal officials have sought voting records involving the group, and one account described about 400 people as having cast ballots. The precise number, the elections involved and whether any ballots were counted are not established in the records described here.
How do state officials describe the problem?
The MVC has said noncitizens appearing on voter rolls is rare. The agency said people who register through the MVC affirm their citizenship and that cases in which noncitizens claim citizenship or voting eligibility are taken seriously.
“Individuals who apply to register to vote through the MVC affirm their citizenship,” an MVC spokesman said. “While it is exceedingly rare that non-citizens claim citizenship or other voter eligibility through the MVC, such instances are taken extremely seriously by this agency.”
The RNC and the New Jersey Republican Party also requested voter rolls from all 21 counties. They said the records included cases in which people seeking naturalization asked to be removed from the rolls, saying they had been registered without knowing it.
Those accounts do not by themselves show that the people voted or that election results were affected. Noncitizens are not eligible to vote in federal elections, and New Jersey officials’ review has focused on determining which registrations were valid and which should be removed or rejected.
What other investigations are underway?
Two Republican-led House committees requested records about New Jersey’s compliance with the Help America Vote Act, the NVRA and the Civil Rights Act of 1960. Their requests include information about election safeguards, the MVC software error, communications with IDEMIA and the state’s use of the federal Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, known as SAVE.
The committees set an Aug. 17 deadline for the records.
The Justice Department also asked Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s administration for information about the approximately 6,600 people affected by the error. The department sought identities, nationalities, addresses and voting records. The request reportedly included records involving about 400 people who cast ballots.
A federal judge also rejected an RNC effort to obtain broad access to New Jersey voter-roll data, according to an account of the proceeding. The available material does not identify the judge, case number or full reasoning for that decision.
What happens next?
The RNC’s Sept. 15 deadline applies to the secretary of state and officials in the six named counties. The available records do not establish whether the officials have complied or whether the RNC has filed the threatened litigation.
The central dispute is over transparency and election-administration safeguards: the RNC says New Jersey must provide records explaining the registrations, while state officials have described the MVC issue as a software error and said affected registrations were removed or blocked pending review.
The available information also does not show that any particular noncitizen knowingly voted, that an illegal ballot changed an election outcome or that anyone has been charged.
