Pennsylvania Secretary of State Al Schmidt dodged an important question this week in a cozy interview on “60 Minutes.”
“If a noncitizen tried to cast a ballot, would you be able to catch it?” interviewer Cecelia Vega asked.
It is a yes or no question, but like the first kid picked in gym class, Schmidt is pretty good at dodgeball; he didn’t answer directly.
“That’s just not something that happens, because when it gets identified, there are severe consequences, whether it’s prosecution and/or deportation from the country,” Schmidt said.
Vega could not muster a follow-up question to press Schmidt. She was happy to accept his denial as a complete answer.
Schmidt had to respond this way because, in truth, the answer is no, election officials could not catch a non-citizen from voting in every scenario, for several reasons.
First, Schmidt’s Department of State has given a counterintuitive directive to counties.
When county election workers receive voter registration applications, they use a database to match the last four digits of the Social Security Number or a driver’s license number to the information on the application. The Federal Help America Vote Act requires counties to make this comparison. This way, counties verify the requester’s identity and assure they are eligible to vote.
But the Pennsylvania Department of State’s directive says voter registrations may not be rejected based solely on a non-match between the applicants’ identifying numbers on their application, and the comparison numbers in the drivers license or Social
