Benson Loses Round in Fight Over Dead People on Michigan Voter Rolls

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson’s latest legal maneuver to avoid removing 25,975 deceased people from the state’s voter rolls has been stymied by a federal court.

Benson moved for dismissal of a case brought against her in November 2021 by the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF) for her failure to clean up the state’s voter registration rolls—in an alleged violation of Section 8 of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993.

On Aug. 25, Benson’s motion to dismiss the case was denied by the Western District Court of Michigan.

The court also denied the motions to intervene filed by the Detroit/Downriver Chapter of the A. Philip Randolph Institute and the Michigan Alliance for Retired Americans, and Rise, Inc.

Additionally, PILF’s suit seeks to force Benson to provide documentation of her efforts to remove deceased registrants from the voter rolls, something she has thus far also failed to do.

Names of 25,975 Voters

PILF notified Benson of the problem in September 2020 and again in November 2020, a year before it filed its lawsuit.

The foundation provided Benson with the names of 25,975 voters its research discovered had passed away but were still on Michigan’s voter rolls.

Of these, 23,663 registrants have been dead for five years or more, and 17,449 have been dead for at least a decade.

The study found that 3,956 registrants had been dead for at least 20 years.

That time span encompasses the terms of both Democrat and Republican secretaries of state, an indication that neither party has been serious about a voter roll cleanup.

J. Christian Adams, president of the Public Interest Legal Foundation. (File photo)

PILF president J. Christian Adams said in a statement about the 2021 case: “For over a year we shared specific data with the Michigan Secretary of State’s Office