A voter fills out his ballot at an early voting location in Alexandria, Va., on Sept. 26, 2022.
Andrew Harnik/AP
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Andrew Harnik/AP
A voter fills out his ballot at an early voting location in Alexandria, Va., on Sept. 26, 2022.
Andrew Harnik/AP
Virginia’s top elections official wrote a letter Thursday announcing the state would withdraw from the Electronic Registration Information Center, or ERIC, a multistate partnership that until early 2022 was considered a widely trusted, bipartisan effort to share voter information.
The move makes Virginia the eighth state to leave ERIC amid fringe conservative media reports and conspiracy theories attempting to connect the system to liberal donors and activists.
Virginia’s departure is notable because the state helped stand up the system in 2012, under former GOP Gov. Bob McDonnell.
As recently as three months ago, Republican voting officials in other states that pulled out were praising it as a “godsend” and “one of the best fraud-fighting tools we’ve got.”
But in a letter obtained by member station VPM, Virginia’s current commissioner of elections, Susan Beals, said a slew of concerns caused her to rethink their membership. She cited the exit of nearby states, “increasing concerns regarding stewardship, maintenance, privacy, and confidentiality of voter information” and “controversy surrounding the historical sharing of data with outside organizations leveraged for political purposes.”
“We will pursue other information arrangements with our neighboring states and look to other opportunities to partner with states in an apolitical fashion,” said Beals.
Beals was appointed to the post in March by Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin. She previously served as an aide to state Sen. Amanda Chase, who went on to become arguably the state’s most prominent election denier.
Beals did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Macaulay Porter, a spokesperson for Youngkin, confirmed in a statement that Virginia was withdrawing from ERIC.
This story originally appeared on NPR
