Bins full of absentee ballots await Wake County Board of Elections review. (Photo: Lynn Bonner)
North Carolina House Republicans want people to write their full Social Security numbers on voter registration applications, an idea that drew criticism from people worried about privacy and security.
The new requirement is included in an expansive elections bill that is moving through the state House.
In addition to requiring the full numbers on registrations, the bill would make the DMV give the state Board of Elections the Social Security numbers of licensed drivers.
As it stands now, people who register to vote are asked to provide a partial Social Security number or a driver’s license number.
At a committee hearing on the bill Wednesday, Rep. Pricey Harrison (D-Guilford) said requiring the full number would violate a federal privacy law from the 1970s.
Rep. Pricey Harrison (D-Guilford) said the bill violates federal law. (NCGA screengrab)“Why are we jumping into this potentially problematic area?” she asked.
Requiring the entire number would increase confidence that voters are accurately identified, bill sponsor Rep. Hugh Blackwell (R-Burke) responded.
The head of an organization that registers voters said people are reluctant to provide partial Social Security numbers on forms. Those worries will be magnified if they’re asked for the full number, said Kate Fellman, executive director of You Can Vote.
“Many voters need reassurance that even the last four digits of their Social will be safe,” she said.
Moreover, the federal Help America Vote Act does not require the information, and a full Social Security number is not proof of citizenship, she said.
Collecting full Social Security numbers on voter registrations will provide hackers and extortionists with another target, Fellman said.
“NC voters should not have to choose between their right to vote and their personal data security,” Fellman wrote in her prepared statement.
Jim Womack, head of the NC Election Integrity Team, a group that trains people to challenge ballots, encouraged legislators to require the full number to improve the electronic voter registration file.
“You can get rid of hundreds of thousands of duplicates,” he said.
Rep. Hugh Blackwell calls the bill a work in progress. (File photo)Blackwell called the bill “a work in progress.”
It won’t get to a vote of the full House for at least a month. The legislature is on a break until the end of August.
Other provisions in the bill stem from GOP Appeals Court Judge Jefferson Griffin’s attempt to overturn his Democratic opponent’s victory in the 2024 election for a seat on the Supreme Court and the state court rulings that resulted from his lawsuit seeking to throw out votes.
Military and overseas voters would be required to provide photo ID with their ballots. Before this year, the state Board of Elections had exempted those voters from the state photo ID law.
People who have never lived in North Carolina but whose parents lived here – likely the children of missionaries, of foreign service members, or members of the military stationed – would no longer be able to vote in local or state elections. Their votes would count only for federal races.
The bill makes clear that people who vote early or by mail and die before Election Day will not have their votes counted.
The Wake County Board of Elections counted several dead voters’ ballots last year, despite State Board instructions not to do it. Democrats on the Wake board said then that current law is unclear.
The revised bill cuts the number of political hires new state Elections Director Sam Hayes would be allowed to make to five, down from the 25 political positions proposed in an earlier version. The elections bill conflicts with a stopgap budget the legislature passed Wednesday, which allows Hayes to make seven political hires.
The bill authorizes another test of signature matching on absentee ballots using the same parameters as the test of last year’s primary ballots. Ten counties will be chosen to test signature matching software on ballots cast in the 2026 primary. The bill says the same counties that participated last time can do it again.
The bill relieves some of the time pressure on local boards to count ballots and on voters who need to provide information for their mail or provisional ballots to count.
County boards would be able to start reviewing information on provisional ballots before Election Day and would be able to start counting early voting ballots and provisional ballots at 9 am on Election Day. Current law says ballot counting can’t start until the polls close.
Absentee voters who forget a signature or don’t provide a photocopy of identification with their ballots will have until noon on the fifth business day after Election Day to correct their mistakes, up from three days.
The bill bans ranked choice voting, a system where voters rank candidates on a single ballot.
Members of the group Democracy Out Loud denounced the bill.
“I think anyone voting for a partisan Board of Elections is cheating,” said Calile DeThomas. “The people of North Carolina deserve to have all of our votes counted,” she added. “We don’t deserve to have our Social Security numbers out there.”
Kathy Martin objected to the ban on ranked choice voting.
“You are damning the future of democracy,” she said. “This bill is bad and it needs to die in committee.”
Hence then, the article about an expansive nc elections bill has voters worried about privacy and identity theft was published today ( ) and is available on NC news line ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( An expansive NC elections bill has voters worried about privacy and identity theft. )
Also on site :
- Russia exposed plot to blow up Black Sea gas pipelines – Putin
- NATO nations could transfer nuclear bomb to Ukraine – Russian intelligence
- Discord cuts ties with Peter Thiel-backed verification software after its code was found tied to U.S. surveillance efforts