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New Jersey officials said Tuesday that approximately 6,600 people who identified themselves as noncitizens while obtaining driver’s licenses or state identification cards were mistakenly registered to vote because of a software error in the state’s Motor Vehicle Commission system.
Gov. Mikie Sherrill, a Democrat, said a preliminary review found that fewer than 400 of those individuals later cast ballots. She described the registrations as the result of a system failure that occurred in 2023 and 2024 and announced an investigation into how the error happened.
“I am appalled by the reckless failures that allowed this to happen and the lack of transparency shown by those in charge at the time,” Sherrill said in a statement.
The governor said the state has begun removing the improperly created voter registrations and will replace the vendor responsible for the software system.
The registrations occurred during the administration of former Gov. Phil Murphy, also a Democrat, who was in office when the software error took place.
The announcement comes as President Donald Trump and other Republicans continue to argue that noncitizen voting is a widespread problem, despite studies and election officials consistently finding such cases to be rare.
Last week, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin claimed more than 250,000 noncitizens were registered to vote across California, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Nevada. The Trump administration has not publicly released the underlying data supporting that estimate.
A White House official later said the estimate was based on commercial databases. Election law experts have questioned that methodology, warning it could significantly overstate the number of ineligible voters because commercial records frequently contain outdated or inaccurate citizenship information.
David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, said the approach is likely to generate numerous false positives.
“I guarantee you, that data includes a ton of people, maybe even a majority of people, who are absolutely eligible voters,” Becker said, warning that removing voters solely on that basis could violate election laws.
The Center for Election Innovation and Research has previously concluded that allegations of widespread noncitizen voting generally stem from misunderstandings, misinterpretations of voter data or unsupported claims.
New Jersey is among several states that allow noncitizens to obtain driver’s licenses and state-issued identification cards, though federal law prohibits noncitizens from voting in federal elections.
State officials said they are continuing to review the registrations and will provide additional information as the investigation progresses.
