COLUMBIA, S.C. — Governor Henry McMaster is calling for a state investigation into concerns about voter registration forms allegedly being given to non-citizens in South Carolina.
Greenville Rep. Adam Morgan started the conversation by posting a picture on social media showing a voter registration form that he said a refugee received from the South Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) through Medicaid.
On Wednesday, McMaster took to social media to say he was contacting the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) to investigate the allegation.
News19 contacted DHHS regarding this alleged incident and received the following statement:
As the state’s Medicaid agency, the South Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (SCDHHS) is required by Section 7 of the National Voter Registration Act Of 1993 to offer voter registration information. SCDHHS does not believe the state Medicaid agency should have a role in voter registration. However, absent the legal authority to make this change, SCDHHS remains required by federal law to provide voter registration application forms with each Medicaid application. SCDHHS believes the 30-year-old NVRA needs to be amended to repeal these overreaching federal requirements. South Carolina’s citizens would be better served by a state Medicaid agency that is able to focus singularly on efficiently operating the state’s Healthy Connections Medicaid program.
The integrity of our elections should be a top concern for every South Carolinian. SCDHHS is aware of reports circulating on social media that an individual who was applying for Medicaid coverage as a refugee was sent a South Carolina Election Commission voter registration declination form. Rep. Morgan has not been in contact with SCDHHS Director Kerr about this topic. SCDHHS is investigating what has been reported on social media. The agency encourages anyone who believes voter registration information was inappropriately distributed by SCDHHS to contact the agency’s fraud department at www.scdhhs.gov/fraud.
Voter registration information is available in SCDHHS county offices, as required by federal law. However, SCDHHS does not process or submit voter registration forms for Medicaid applicants or members. Voter registration applications are processed, if appropriate, by the South Carolina Election Commission.
SLED said they have received the governor's letter and will review it.
The State Election Commission (SEC) said the voter registration forms are only applications and are given to people at several state agencies, including the Department of Motor Vehicles (SCDMV) and the Department of Social Services (DSS).
A statement on the SEC website says:
The SEC is actively auditing voter data through the Department of Homeland Security’s Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) Program database to ensure that only U.S. citizens are included on the active list of registered voters. Regardless of the method of registration, no voter may be registered in South Carolina without signing an oath swearing that they are a citizen of the United States. The auditing process ensures that any bad actors are removed from voter rolls and held accountable through state and federal election law statutes.
To date, the SEC has not received any specific information that non-U.S. citizens are fraudulently being registered to vote in our state.
“The SEC will not allow fraudulent voter registration to happen on our watch,” said Howie Knapp, Executive Director of the SEC. “Should we receive or discover information that non-U.S. citizens are being registered to vote in our state, we will immediately report to our law enforcement partners for investigation and prosecution to the fullest extent of the law. The SEC will continue to be vigilant in following our state’s election laws to ensure elections in South Carolina are conducted with integrity.”
The SEC said that recent online postings and Rep. Morgan's claims have led to overwhelming calls and threats to the commission—enough to require that law enforcement station an officer at the Election Commission in an overabundance of caution.
“In the state of South Carolina, we have not had issues and we’ve never had an instance of a non-citizen voting in the state of South Carolina,” said TJ Lundeen, Director of Public Information with SEC.
Lundeen emphasizes the form is standard, and that protocols are in place for voting.
“Even if that were a form that was a voters registration application, there is still a vetting process that happens so we would still go in as the county board and as the SEC, we would still go in and vet that person to ensure they meet all the criteria to register to vote including citizenship,” says Lundeen.
Adding the incident has led to threats against election staff.
"We've had a flurry of calls, I think probably over 100 calls on this matter, emails, voicemails that have come in and some of those have risen to the level of being threatening and telling our employees to watch their backs,” Lundeen adds.
News19 did reach out to Representative Adam Morgan's office for comment, and did not hear back.