Deep Dive: One Group Fighting To Safeguard Against Illegal Voting in November 2024 | Ep. 867

This episode explores efforts by America First Legal to combat illegal voting and the mechanisms in place to ensure voting integrity.

1. America First Legal is working to identify and remove non-citizens from voter rolls using federal data.
2. There are systemic vulnerabilities at points like DMV registrations that allow for potential illegal voter registrations.
3. Existing laws and systems like the SAVE system are underutilized and flawed but can be leveraged more effectively.
4. Political will is crucial, as state governments must choose to utilize available federal resources to cleanse voter rolls.
5. The urgency of addressing these issues is amplified by the approaching elections and the narrow margins in swing states.

1: Introduction

Megyn Kelly introduces the topic of illegal voting and the importance of this issue in the upcoming election. Gene Hamilton: "Look, everyone in America has heard about problems related to non-citizens being on voter rolls."

2: The Problem

Discussion of how non-citizens are added to voter rolls, with focus on DMV processes and the weaknesses in current laws that allow this to happen. Gene Hamilton: "It's a very frequent occurrence, especially at the point of obtaining a driver's license."

3: The Legal Framework

Exploration of the legal mechanisms that can be used to tackle the issue, including the SAVE system and 8 USC 1373. Gene Hamilton: "DHS has a database that states are eligible to ping against, but it has its limitations."

4: Political Challenges

Conversation about the political and practical challenges in implementing these systems. Gene Hamilton: "This is a matter of common sense. This is a matter of good government."

5: Closing Thoughts

Final thoughts on the importance of maintaining the integrity of the electoral process. Megyn Kelly: "This is definitely something that people are very worried about on top of the issue of just stealing."

1. Verify your registration details: Ensure your own voter registration details are correct and report any discrepancies.
2. Stay informed: Follow local and national news on voting laws and policies.
3. Participate in community forums: Engage in or organize community discussions on voting integrity.
4. Contact representatives: Urge your local and state representatives to implement stringent checks on voter rolls.
5. Educate others: Spread awareness about the importance of safeguarding the voting process.

Megyn Kelly is joined by Gene Hamilton, executive director and general counsel of America First Legal (AFL), for this deep dive special episode, to discuss how AFL is raising awareness about illegal voters, what initiatives each state could be doing to fight this problem, the exact way illegal voters use the DMV to get on voter rolls, how states can learn to identify this problem, and more.

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Gene Hamilton

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America First Legal

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Guest Name(s):

Gene Hamilton

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Megyn Kelly
Everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to the Megyn Kelly show. Early voting in America starts in a couple of weeks, and in the shadow of 2020, many Americans are wondering about efforts to ensure the safety and legality of our vote. We wanted to take a deep dive on this issue with someone whose organization is making it a point to stop illegal voting in America. Gene Hamilton is that Mandev? He is executive director and general counsel at America First Legal, and he joins me now to discuss what America first legal or AFL is doing.

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Gene, welcome to the show.

Gene Hamilton
Megan. Thanks for having me.

Megyn Kelly
Okay, so just outline the problem for me first. As you know, you were looking at it before you decided to tackle it.

Gene Hamilton
Speaker one of course. Look, everyone in America has heard about problems related to non citizens or illegal aliens being on voter rolls. This is a very common occurrence. Now, the left would want you to believe, of course, that this never happens. No one would ever be an illegal alien and register to vote. But it's actually more common than what you would actually think. It's actually a very frequent occurrence, especially at the point of obtaining a driver's license or other such things where someone can get added to a state's list of voters where they shouldn't be, or if they actually use a federal form where they just simply check a box that says that, I swear that I am a citizen, now please register me to vote. Those are real problems. There should never be an illegal alien on any state's voter rolls. Now, look, there are a number of states who have been doing some things for a number of years that are kind of very basic and that are helpful and that are good, but they don't go far enough. So what we have done at America first legal is identify a plan that every state across America can use steps that they can take to remove illegal aliens from their list of voters using data and information that they're entitled to receive from the Department of Homeland Security.

Megyn Kelly
All right, stand by.

We'll get to the cure in a minute. I want to spend another few minutes on the problem. So is it the case? Because when I lived in New York City, they passed a law trying to make it legal for illegal aliens to vote. That was not upheld. But are there states out there, like the crazy New York, you know, policy that are actually trying, you know, you mentioned driver's license for licenses for illegals. We know Tim Waltz wanted this in Minnesota. So there are states out there that are saying it's fine for illegals to get driver's licenses. And I guess there could be some as crazy as New York where then they say, and they should have the right to vote. Do you know what, whether that's out there?

Gene Hamilton
Yeah, and it certainly is. And it can also happen in states that aren't crazy. Um, because there is a single point of failure, and the single point of failure is at the point of the person getting the driver's license from a clerk at the DMV. That is your single point of failure. So if you are a clerk at the DMV and someone comes to you, maybe they're an illegal alien, and maybe it's a crazy state that says, hey, we give driver's licenses to everyone who's here, regardless of their immigration status. Or maybe you're a good state, but your laws in your state say that if you're here and you have work authorization from the Department of Homemade Security, that we'll go ahead and give you a driver's license. Now, what can happen, though, at that single point of failure, at the point of getting your driver's license, is that at least before the Real ID act, and there's still problems after the Real ID act, is that it's just a matter of somebody checking a box that says, I'm a citizen and I want to be registered to vote. This is something that happens all over the place, and it is something that leads to people being on the voter rolls, which, of course, is an important point to point out to everyone right now that the issue here is not necessarily that an illegal alien is 100% of the time going to go register to vote at the DMV or through the mail, and that they are then going to show up at the ballot box and themselves cast a vote. The issue here, of course, is that they are getting their name registered to vote.

And when you have states all across the country using mail and ballots, right, this is all about ballot harvesting and getting as many names on as many ballots as you possibly can turned in, get the votes counted, of course, before anyone can do anything. And then at the end of the day, say, look, there's more ballots that were cast for so and so than the other one.

Megyn Kelly
Explain that. What do you mean? So democratic operatives engaging in fraud would figure out who's an illegal and who's not and try to send in a ballot for this guy that he doesn't even know he's sending in.

Gene Hamilton
Look, that's certainly something that can happen, and it's certainly something that can happen, especially in transient communities. So if you're at an apartment, your listeners across the country will understand that if you're an apartment, it's oftentimes you'll get mail first, the prior residence.

It's especially going to be true in transient communities populated by immigrants. And so if you are somebody who gets registered to vote and you're in one of these states that does 100% mail in balloting, one of these states, that makes it extremely easy to request your ballot to be sent in via the mail, and no one ever has to check or confirm that you are in fact a citizen. That at some point along the process that you produce documentation that shows that you are in fact a citizen of the United States. The recipes for fraud are almost unlimited in terms of what can possibly be done.

Megyn Kelly
How do we have any idea how many illegal aliens are currently registered or have been registered over the past few years in the United States and in particular in the swing states.

Gene Hamilton
It's a wonderful question and I don't know that there's any kind of actual reliable evidence indicating one number or another. The fact of the matter, though, is that there are millions upon millions of illegal aliens who have entered the United States over the last three and a half years that they are here and they are loose in the United States. And when you look at the margin of victory in a place like Arizona or in a place like Georgia, where just a couple, you know, a couple thousand, 10,000, 20,000 votes can make the difference in the outcome of an election, the recipe is there and it's really a matter of how do we make sure that there are none on the voter rolls. If it's 100, that's a problem. If it's 1000, it's a problem. If it's 100,000, it's a problem. Now some of your listeners have probably seen in recent weeks there have been a number of elected officials across the country putting out press releases saying things like, hey, guess what? We removed 4000 non citizens from our voter rolls over the last year or so.

Megyn Kelly
2500 in Pennsylvania.

Gene Hamilton
Exactly.

Megyn Kelly
Virginia has been cracking down. North Carolina identified more than 1400.

Yeah. Arizona said we've identified 42,000 people as federal only registrants, which I don't totally understand, but yes. So more and more are coming out to say they're making this effort and they've identified some. So keep going.

Gene Hamilton
Yeah, absolutely. So, and that's great. And what they're typically doing in those situations is using a system called save that DHS administers. And so for your viewers at home and listeners at home, if they're, think about it this way, DHS has a database that states are eligible to ping against, but to use that database to have it be reliable, you have to have some kind of an identifier that links the person to an identifier in the DHS database. And so that identifier tends to be what's known as an alien registration number.

And so think of this as like you're searching for a friend on social media, right? And if you're searching for a friend and you have their email address, maybe you can actually find the person because you have their email address.

But if you don't have their email address, you're never going to find the person.

And this is depending on the privacy settings. And so this is the single point of failure for the save system is if you have someone who's registering to vote, whether that's with a federal form and we can touch more on that in a minute, or whether it's somebody who registered to vote at the DMV.

Chances are they didn't provide you with an alien registration number.

Chances are that they just gave you their name and their date of birth, which makes this DHS safe system essentially worthless to get the folks off of the voter rolls who didn't actually give you their alien registration number. So when you see a press release from someone saying, hey, we removed, you know, two, 4000 people from our voter rolls using the DHS save system, well that's fabulous and that's great. Now just imagine how many more you can do if you could instead search by things like a name and a date of birth.

Megyn Kelly
Hmm. Okay, so you're saying there's a lot more on that federal registry who would be illegal. We just, we don't have the technology right now to capture them and so they will remain on the voter registration rolls as illegal aliens? The system is flawed.

Gene Hamilton
Well, yes and no. So the system that DHS built for the states to use, called save, is flawed and it has that issue. But here's the great thing, and here's the fun thing for all of the states across the country, and it's actually part of a plan that we laid out for all of the states across the country to use, which is there's a law in the books in the Immigration Internationality act at eight USC 1373, and it says that a state or local government can get information from the Department of Homeland Security to verify or ascertain the citizenship status of any individual in their jurisdiction for any purpose authorized under law, and that DHS has to provide that information to the state or the locality. And so what DHS is doing is that they've been telling the states and the local governments, hey, you have to use a saved database and you have to use this alien registration number as the query. Oh, and by the way, DHS charges the states and localities to use it. But there is a separate provision of law that no one was using up until recently that says that actually the states are entitled to receive this information as a matter of law, and it's about any individual and it's to ascertain or to verify their citizenship or immigration status for any purpose authorized under law. And so any purpose authorized under law certainly has to include ensuring that there are eligible voters on your voter rolls and there's not any illegal aliens or for example, permanent residents or anyone else who's not entitled to vote on the voter rolls.

And so the states have the ability to ask DHS to give them the information that they need about anyone that they have any question about on their voter rolls.

Megyn Kelly
They just need the will to do it. But here's my question. So they need the will to do it. But in my experience, the only states that would have the will to do it would be blue states. And they're not going to do it. I mean, and they don't like, they're, they're not going to, and the red states, um, might want to do it, but that doesn't really help republicans make sure there are fair elections. Right. So then what do the swing states do? The odds of the swing states actually taking advantage, advantage of this, I think are slim and none because, I don't know, most of them tend to have democratic governors.

Gene Hamilton
Yeah, look, it's, it's a real conundrum. Um, and you've identified it is everyone should be doing this, though, because DHS has the capability to verify based on a name, based on a date of birth. They do have a technological capability of doing this. And so this is a matter of common sense. This is a matter of good government. This should not be a red or a blue issue or anything in between. This is a common sense measure that every state across the country should be using. And if the citizens of each state petition their leaders and they say, hey, look, why aren't we doing this one way or the other? Why aren't we trying to make sure that there aren't people who shouldn't be on our voter rolls voting regardless of how they vote? And this is one of these situations where the solution is there. The federal law provides a remedy and the states can use it to get people off this, again, just very good government kind of basic obligation thing to do.

But don't you think, don't you think.

Megyn Kelly
That they'll look at, they'll slow roll it, this administration be like, sure, we're definitely going to comply with your many requests and we'll get that information to you probably around February.

Gene Hamilton
Yeah. Right. Well, so that's, again, you've identified a very real problem, which is why what states need to do is give DHS hard and fast deadlines. And if DHS doesn't comply in a reasonable amount of time with the information the states are obligated to receive under federal law, the states should go into federal court and sue and demand immediate remedies to get the information that they need. Given that there's an election coming up soon. Given as you identified, early voting starts very soon in many states.

Megyn Kelly
And the time in Pennsylvania, September is like right around the corner. So can you tell me, do you know what Virginia is doing? Some kind of interested in what Glenn Youngkin is doing down there. Clearly does care about voter integrity. It seems like he's making sure that there's going to be paper ballots there, mandating a documented chain of custody for the paper ballots.

They don't use voting machines down there, just paper ballot counting machines. But they also have to have the paper ballots retained for 22 months.

The absentee ballots seem to be more secure than they are in other states requiring a Social Security match. I don't know. It seems like Glenn Youngkin is one governor who's in not exactly a swing state, but it's still a little purple, trying to set things right.

Gene Hamilton
Yeah, it certainly seems that way. And his, his efforts should be commended. Every governor across the country should be doing more, and they should be doing as much as they possibly can do to do things that are just common sense. I mean, look, for the viewers and listeners at home, if your elected officials are not doing things that would be common sense measures that you would think that maybe even like the bank would require for you to be able to go take money out of your account, verifying your identity, ensuring that there's proper paper trails, doing all those types of good governance measures.

Why shouldn't we expect the same of our elected leaders when it comes to our elections, when it comes time for the citizenry to cast the kind of the ultimate pinnacle of democratic action in society, which is casting that vote, that ballot and getting that ballot counted properly and having it administered in a way that people can have confidence in the integrity of the system and in the future of their democratic society.

Megyn Kelly
Yeah, I mean, this is definitely something that people are very worried about on top of the issue of just stealing. You know, they're very worried about people stealing ballots and harvesting and taking. But this is an area that you're saying this is an area that can be exploited by bad actors. That's one of the many reasons. It could be the illegal alien or it could be somebody who's taking advantage of the fact that there is an illegal alien who's registered, who might not know he's getting a ballot by mail and Bob's your uncle. Boom. I mean, Biden won Georgia by 11,000 votes. That's just one state. So every vote counts, as we know. Gene, thank you. Thanks for all the great work you guys do at America. First legal love. Love all of it.

Gene Hamilton
Thanks very much for having me on. Really appreciate it.

Megyn Kelly
All the best. And thanks to all of you for joining us today for this special deep dive into the problem of how to solve the illegal aliens voting in our elections. Back later today. Hungry root is one very easy way to eat healthy. They send you fresh, high quality groceries, simple, delicious recipes and essential supplements. It's like having someone else do all the planning and shopping so you don't even have to think about it. Hungry root gets to know your personal health goals, dietary restrictions, favorite foods, how much time you want to spend cooking and more. Then they build you a personalized cart for the week, including easy four ingredient recipes. Oh, I love that. To put those groceries to use.

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