Voter registration fraud is not a groundless conspiracy. It is not a hypothetical threat to election integrity.
In Nevada, a battleground state that could decide the presidency and control of the U.S. Senate, it is real.
Last week, I met with two immigrant noncitizens who are not eligible to vote, but who nonetheless are active registered voters for Tuesday's election. They said they were signed up by Culinary Local 226.
They speak and understand enough English to get by. But they don't read English especially well. They say the Culinary official who registered them to vote didn't tell them what they were signing and didn't ask whether they were citizens. The immigrants said they trusted that the union official's request was routine, thought nothing of it and went about their work.
Then the election drew closer. Then the Culinary canvassers started seeking them out and ordering them to go vote.
One of the immigrants was visited at home by a Culinary representative and said the operative made threats of deportation if no ballot was cast.
They didn't understand how, as noncitizens, they could be registered to vote if it's illegal for them to vote in a U.S. election. They didn't understand that, upon being signed up, not only is their registration public record, but the record of whether they've voted is public as well.
After a few days of early voting, the union knew the immigrants still hadn't voted. So union canvassers kept visiting.
One day, when a Culinary representative was told the immigrant wasn't a citizen and wouldn't vote, things got testy. The immigrant was "in so much trouble," the Culinary operative said, according to Brenda Moraine, a local immigrant advocate who was there.
The immigrants spoke with me on the condition that I provide no identifying information about them beyond their membership in the Culinary. They're afraid of reprisals from the union, they're afraid of losing their jobs, and they're concerned that their signatures are on a government document that says, in part, "I swear or affirm I am a U.S. citizen. I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct."
