French technology company IDEMIA is pushing back against New Jersey officials after being blamed for an error that resulted in thousands of noncitizens being added to the state’s voter rolls.
Earlier this week, New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill announced that approximately 6,600 noncitizens had been registered to vote because of what she described as a software problem involving data transmitted from the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission.
According to Politico, Sherrill said the error occurred between June 2023 and June 2024.
“It’s unacceptable that the vendor released software with such a glaring error, it’s unacceptable that the MVC took a year to get this issue fixed and it’s unacceptable that no one in the previous administration brought this to light, demanded accountability, or took action when it happened years ago,” Sherrill said during a news conference.
Because the affected period began in 2023, the registrations occurred during the administration of former Gov. Phil Murphy.
Sherrill also sought to reassure voters that the problem had not affected election outcomes.
According to the governor, fewer than 400 of the affected individuals cast ballots after being registered, and state officials have said they have found no evidence that any election result was altered.
IDEMIA, however, disputes the state’s account and says its software accurately recorded the information provided by applicants.
In a statement to the New York Post, company spokeswoman Lisa Shoemaker said the records submitted to the Motor Vehicle Commission and the Division of Elections reflected exactly what applicants reported.
“The 6,600 records submitted to the MVC and Division of Elections contained correct information according to the design specifications as set out by the state,” Shoemaker said.
According to IDEMIA, each of the affected applicants indicated that they wanted to register to vote while also answering “No” when asked whether they were U.S. citizens.
“All 6,600 individuals indicated ‘Yes’ to wanting to register to vote and ‘NO’ to being a US Citizen,” Shoemaker said. “This information was recorded correctly and always available.”
She added that “at no point was a noncitizen ever marked as a citizen in the database.”
Shoemaker emphasized that IDEMIA does not determine voter eligibility or enroll applicants onto the voter rolls.
“IDEMIA does not control or manage voter enrollment, our role is simply to collect self-reported citizenship and interest data,” she said.
If the company’s explanation is accurate, it raises questions about why records identifying applicants as noncitizens were ultimately processed for voter registration rather than being filtered out before reaching election officials.
The New York Post reported that the competing explanations leave unanswered questions about whether New Jersey had sufficient safeguards in place to identify applicants who indicated they were not U.S. citizens or to address situations involving inaccurate information submitted during the application process.
State officials continue to maintain that the software—not the state’s procedures—was responsible.
According to the Post, one state official said applicants who answered “No” to the citizenship question should never have had their records transmitted to the Division of Elections.
“Anytime somebody answers ‘no’ to the citizenship question, that record should not be transmitted to the Division of Elections,” the official said.
The dispute has left the central question unresolved: whether the failure originated with the software itself, the way it was configured by the state, or another step in New Jersey’s voter registration process.
