Secretary Gorbea Updates Ongoing Voter Roll Maintenance, Announces Latest Efforts

PROVIDENCE, RI – Secretary of State Nellie M. Gorbea is providing the following update on the continuous work of her Elections Division to maintain accurate voter rolls and ensure that Rhode Islanders can trust the integrity of our state's elections. Rhode Island currently has 713,481 active registered voters. An additional 88,786 voter records have been marked inactive – the first step in the multi-year process of removing an outdated registration under federal law.

"Rhode Island's voter rolls are the cleanest they've been in years," said

Secretary Gorbea. "My team and our local boards of canvassers conduct voter list maintenance every single day. We also work with the Department of Health and election officials in other states to preserve accuracy while adhering to strict federal laws for voter removal. Because of this consistent and transparent process, we have legally removed 182,018 outdated voter records since I took office in 2015."

Daily maintenance efforts include updates from the Division of Motor Vehicles, death records from the Department of Health, notifications from other jurisdictions on voters who may have moved, and data analyst positions created by Secretary Gorbea to continuously review the voter file for accuracy.

This month, Secretary Gorbea's Elections Division will also send mailings to approximately 25,000 voters who may have moved to a new address according to the United States Postal Service (USPS). The mailings will prompt voters to update their voter registration information if needed.

In 2015, Secretary Gorbea enrolled Rhode Island in the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), a multistate partnership that uses secure data-matching to improve the accuracy and efficiency of states' voter registration lists. This past June, Secretary Gorbea sent a mailing to Rhode Island voters that ERIC indicated may have recently moved to another state. More than 6,000 voters have responded so far to confirm that they have moved, and their registrations have been canceled accordingly.

Rhode Island's voter rolls are a public record. Information on the number of voters in the state can be found on Secretary Gorbea's website, and anyone may request a copy of the voter file from the Elections Division. All registered Rhode Island voters are encouraged to visit vote.ri.gov to confirm that their voter information is up to date.