Virginia is the latest Republican-led state pulling out of ERIC, an interstate effort to maintain accurate voter rolls by sharing data about people moving.

Maryland and D.C. are still in it.

North Carolina, West Virginia and Tennessee aren't.

virginiamercury.com
Virginia joins Republican states pulling out of multi-state voter list program - Virginia Mercury
Virginia is pulling out of a once-uncontroversial interstate program created to help states maintain accurate voter rolls that has recently drawn the ire of

Virginia is pulling out of an interstate voter list program targeted by Trump-supporting "election integrity" activists.

Last year, a top election lawyer in the office of
@JasonMiyaresVA
called the ERIC program "a benefit to the Commonwealth"

virginiamercury.com
Virginia joins Republican states pulling out of multi-state voter list program - Virginia Mercury
Virginia is pulling out of a once-uncontroversial interstate program created to help states maintain accurate voter rolls that has recently

Virginia joins Republican states pulling out of multi-state voter list program

BY: GRAHAM MOOMAW - MAY 11, 2023 6:26 PM

Virginia is pulling out of a once-uncontroversial interstate program created to help states maintain accurate voter rolls that has recently drawn the ire of right-wing “election integrity” activists who see it as nefarious. ... In a letter sent Thursday to the head of the Washington-based Electronic Registration Information Center, Virginia Elections Commissioner Susan Beals said the state would no longer participate in the data-sharing program despite being one of seven founding states in 2012.

Beals listed a variety of reasons, including increased uncertainty and the declining participation of other Republican-led states, concerns about the “confidentiality of voter information” and “controversy surrounding the historical sharing of data with outside organizations leveraged for political purposes.” ... “In short, ERIC’s mandate has expanded beyond that of its initial intent – to improve the accuracy of voter rolls,” Beals wrote.

The move may be the sharpest policy reversal yet for a Virginia Department of Elections now run by an appointee of Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who campaigned on election integrity in 2021.

Less than a year ago, a high-ranking state lawyer assigned to handle election issues by Republican Attorney General Jason Miyares defended ERIC’s usefulness in response to someone who contacted the office concerned that data gathered through the program was being shared with outside groups for partisan efforts. Josh Lief, whom the attorney general’s office has identified as one of the leaders of its election integrity unit, called ERIC “a benefit to the Commonwealth.” ... “Virginia was a charter member and it has grown to 33 states including many conservative states like Texas and Florida,” Lief wrote. “Again, we joined when Bob McDonnell was Governor and Ken Cuccinelli was Attorney General. ERIC is used to clean up voter rolls and check for people that vote more than once in multiple states.”

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GRAHAM MOOMAW
A veteran Virginia politics reporter, Graham grew up in Hillsville and Lynchburg, graduating from James Madison University and earning a master's degree in journalism from the University of Maryland. Before joining the Mercury in 2019, he spent six years at the Richmond Times-Dispatch, most of that time covering the governor's office, the General Assembly and state politics. He also covered city hall and politics at The Daily Progress in Charlottesville.