Los Angeles eliminates 1.2 million inactive voters

Los Angeles County, California, removed 1.2 million inactive voters as part of a settlement it reached with the conservative activist group Judicial Watch (JW) following a court case.

The nonprofit JW pressured the county to do a review of its voters in order to have "cleaner" elections and after an extensive check Los Angeles decided to remove the millions of voters who were listed as "inactive" on its rolls.

"This long overdue voter roll clean-up of 1.2 million registrations in Los Angeles County is a historic victory and means California elections are less at risk for fraud," said Tom Fitton, president of the activist group.

The demand

Figures from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission revealed that, as of 2017, Los Angeles' voter registration was 112% of its adult citizen population.

Faced with the number of inactive registrations, JW filed a lawsuit along with four registered voters in Los Angeles, noting that it possessed the "highest number of inactive registrations of any single county in the country."

The lawsuit led the county to reach a settlement in which they committed to a major overhaul that followed the National Voter Registration Act, which states that all of its states must keep their voter rolls accurate.

Los Angeles had to send 1.6 million address confirmation notices to those citizens who were listed as "inactive" on its voter rolls, wait for responses, and remove those who did not respond and did not vote in the last two federal elections.

"Building on this success, Judicial Watch will continue its lawsuits and activism to clean up voter rolls and to promote and protect cleaner elections," Fitton said after getting Los Angeles to make progress on the accuracy of its rolls.