Marshall police investigating 2 reports of voter registration fraud
MARSHALL — Marshall Police are investigating two reports of potential voter registration fraud in Marshall, according to daily incident reports from Thursday.
The incidents may have involved individual people registering to vote when they were not eligible, said Lyon County Attorney Rick Maes.
Maes said the county attorney’s office receives reports of potential voter registration fraud from the Minnesota State Auditor’s Office, if there are discrepancies in state records. Maes said he then sends those reports on to law enforcement for investigation. Maes said he forwarded Marshall Police two reports of potential fraud, one from December 2018 and one from Nov. 8, 2019.
The Lyon County attorney’s office doesn’t have the ability to investigate those reports, so they go to local law enforcement, Maes said.
Reports of voter registration fraud don’t always end up in criminal charges, Maes said. The reports from the State Auditor’s Office can sometimes be traced back to a person — for example, a felon — who registered to vote when they weren’t eligible. Other times, he said, the registration discrepancy involves a person whose voting rights had actually been restored, or someone who incorrectly filled out a driver’s license form.