After revelations that Oregon’s “motor voter” system registered hundreds of possible noncitizens, the state government launched an audit. Auditors found one in 35 voters didn’t have proof of citizenship — then looked the other way.
Oregon officials discovered in September hundreds of potential noncitizens had registered to vote. They examined limited data and eventually found the motor voter system had placed more than 1,600 possible ineligible voters on the rolls.
State leaders commissioned an audit — which, as Oregon journalist Jeff Eager first reported, found one in 35 voters labeled as “citizens” had no proof of such citizenship in the motor voter system.
The state’s motor voter system reportedly registered 766,756 people total to vote, as of September. The one-in-35 ratio (2.8 percent), applied across the state, suggests the system may have registered more than 21,470 voters without proof of citizenship.
Instead of flagging this lack of documentation as a massive gap in election integrity, the auditor — Chicago firm Baker Tilly — dismissed it, saying this would probably be too small to decide elections.
“Although the number of potentially ineligible individuals being automatically registered to vote is likely too small to affect the outcome of an election, the existence of such cases poses a moderate reputational and compliance risk,” the audit reads.
It simply expressed concern the security gap could “undermine public trust in the voter registration process” and bring “increased scrutiny.”
But, as of November 2024, the Oregon DMV already registered 54,600 voters who have not proven citizenship.
“The thing that got me the most was the consultant opining the error margin likely wouldn’t decide any elections,” Eager said in a direct message on X. He pointed to the state’s May special district elections, in which 25 races were so close they triggered a recount.
The audit, released July 1, noted numerous issues in Oregon’s motor voter system — the lack of citizenship proof was only the first.
Other problems included a lack of documentation when staff review documents, a lack of training policy, and a lack of a “formal, centralized process for escalating significant issues or errors” in the motor voter system. It also said “formal user access reviews are not performed for the O[regon] M[otor] V[oter] system.”
When Oregon officials occasionally glimpse into the state’s voting system, they favor and excuse left-wing groups — after all, they only discovered the potential noncitizen voters after the leftist Institute for Responsive Government (IRG) inquired into the matter.
After the initial discovery, state officials switched into panic mode. They scheduled a briefing call with the left-wing Center for Secure and Modern Elections — which, according to InfluenceWatch, falls under the umbrella of leftist dark money giant Arabella Advisors and advocates “automatic voter registration.”
Notably, IRG Executive Director Sam Oliker-Friedland is chief counsel for CSME. He appeared in a video in the summer of 2024 with Oregon’s then-Elections Director Molly Woon, claiming registering to vote is “unnecessarily complicated” and that automatic voter registration would be a “simple solution.”
Eager was first to report on the damage control call with CSME. He said the group’s “Oregon lobbyist” was part of the meeting. He obtained notes of the call through public records requests.
In these notes, reported by Eager, officials recorded “national systems that check US citizenships.” The first system was the SAVE immigration database, but officials admitted it “needs a number, we don’t have it.” Officials also mentioned another database in the notes called SOLVE — which apparently verifies social security numbers — but said it “doesn’t tell if there is a citizen, lots have social security number” [sic].
The notes indicate the “lookback period” for the state’s voter “data review” was limited to voter registrations since January 2021 for those who showed passports, and since January 2020 for those who showed birth certificates. But without further explanation, officials redacted a single point in this section of the notes. Notably, Oregon began issuing driver’s licenses to illegal aliens in 2021.
“When the Governor’s office finally produced the notes, they redacted part of it,” Eager said. “The part they redacted appears to be a reference to a possible source of information to help them figure out how many people they’d registered without proof of citizenship.”
He said this raises the question: Is there another source with records of Oregon noncitizen voters?
“Each time someone from outside is given a chance to review Oregon’s motor voter noncitizen voting,” Eager said, “they find new problems.”
Logan Washburn is a staff writer covering election integrity. He is a spring 2025 fellow of The College Fix. He graduated from Hillsdale College, served as Christopher Rufo’s editorial assistant, and has bylines in The Wall Street Journal, The Tennessean, and The Daily Caller. Logan is from Central Oregon but now lives in rural Michigan.
