2007: Study Concludes Real Cases of Voter Fraud Extremely Few; Such Cases Are ‘More Rare than Death by Lightning’

The Brennan Center for Justice at New York University’s School of Law issues an in-depth report entitled “The Truth about Voter Fraud.” The report is written and overseen by Justin Levitt, counsel for the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center. Levitt’s study analyzes reports over the last 10 years from around the nation, and finds that real instances of voter fraud are a vanishingly small number, usually less than a tenth or even a hundredth of a percent. Voter fraud of the sort that is usually alleged, he writes, is “more rare than death by lightning.… It is more likely that an individual will be struck by lightning than that he will impersonate another voter at the polls.”
'Voter Fraud' Usually Conflated with Other Kinds of Election Irregularities - Levitt continues: “‘[V]oter fraud’ occurs when individuals cast ballots despite knowing that they are ineligible to vote, in an attempt to defraud the election system. This sounds straightforward. And yet, voter fraud is often conflated, intentionally or unintentionally, with other forms of election misconduct or irregularities.”
Allegations Almost Always Exaggerated - Levitt writes that the allegations often stem from dramatic and unverified stories from bygone days, and those stories “make… a popular scapegoat” for other, non-criminal issues such as a vote not going the way someone wishes it had gone. “In the aftermath of a close election, losing candidates are often quick to blame voter fraud for the results,” Levitt writes. “Legislators cite voter fraud as justification for various new restrictions on the exercise of the franchise. And pundits trot out the same few anecdotes time and again as proof that a wave of fraud is imminent.” However, he finds: “Allegations of widespread voter fraud, however, often prove greatly exaggerated. It is easy to grab headlines with a lurid claim (‘Tens of thousands may be voting illegally!’); the follow-up—when any exists—is not usually deemed newsworthy. Yet on closer examination, many of the claims of voter fraud amount to a great deal of smoke without much fire. The allegations simply do not pan out.”
Allegations Used to Justify Restrictive Voter Requirements - The false allegations, he writes, have provided, and will continue to provide, justifications for restrictive policies such as heightened requirements for voter registration, voter identification requirements, enhanced demands for proof of residency, and others that actively restrict the ability of many legal voters to participate in the democratic process. [Levitt, 2007 ; Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, 2012]