A nonprofit law firm that had accused Allegheny County of violating federal law by not undertaking a “reasonable effort” to maintain its voter rolls dropped its lawsuit this week after the two parties reached a settlement.
Having asked the court to order the county to immediately probe the cases of potentially inaccurate voter registrations it identified, the Public Interest Legal Foundation — run by a former member of President Donald Trump’s now-defunct voter fraud commission — dropped the suit after it was determined the county undertook such an effort, and would agree to sharing more information.
According to the settlement signed by both parties’ lawyers, Allegheny County analyzed the data provided by the law firm — which alleged several thousand faulty registration records — and “made the determinations and/or performed the voter list maintenance actions” requested.
The county also agreed to provide additional information to the foundation — within 60 days — regarding several of the alleged registration discrepancies, including the registrations of purportedly deceased individuals, duplicate registrations and those of individuals aged 110 years or older, according to the signed documentation.
Allegheny County also is also to respond to one more data inquiry from the foundation — if it has one — within the next year.
Among other alleged inaccuracies, the law firm originally had cited more than 3,700 sets of duplicate, triplicate or quadruplicate voter registration records on the county’s rolls; more than 1,500 that had dates-of-birth listed more than a century ago; more than 1,500 registrations of deceased voters that should have been canceled, but remained active; and more than 7,400 containing erroneous information that didn’t correctly identify name changes, including, for example, by way of marriage.
A spokesman for the foundation said it’s a “bit unknown” what information the county will be compelled to share from this point forward, but that no matter what, he sees it as a way of opening a communication channel and getting insight into how some of these errors occurred.
“Allegheny County shows a pretty wide variety of ways in which these systems are glitching,” foundation spokesman Logan Churchwell said. “If we can figure out exactly where glitches are, we can patch them before problems worsen.”
Reiterating that at no point did the plaintiff allege there was any voter fraud going on, Allegheny County Solicitor Andrew Szefi said the crux of the settlement was that the foundation was satisfied with what actions the county had provided and explanations it had given.
“The Elections Division engages in constant voter roll maintenance due to factors such as new registrations, voter relocation, name changes and deaths,” Mr. Szefi said in a statement. “Any necessary maintenance of the voter rolls is performed in accordance with all applicable state and Federal laws.”
Mr. Szefi said the county agreed to look at another one-time submission of data within the next year, but hasn’t pledged that any kind of action will be taken. If actions need to be taken, he said, “then we would do that.”
Julian Routh: jrouth@post-gazette.com, 412-263-1952, Twitter @julianrouth.
First Published: May 19, 2020, 10:18 p.m.
