Frederick County, Maryland has approximately 400 residents who are both registered to vote and have declined jury duty because they are not US citizens. Of those 400, Maryland State Delegate Pat McDonough says, at least 100 have voted in elections since 2006.
This claim is consistent with a recent study that found non-citizens have voted in elections nationwide, and may well have been the difference-makers in close elections. With the Maryland Gubernatorial race a statistical tie, non-citizen voters could be the difference-makers once again.
Delegate McDonough (R-Baltimore County) announced a new lawsuit by four Frederick County residents “seeking a mandatory review by election officials” of the 400 registered non-citizens. He’s also calling on state prosecutor to conduct similar investigations in Maryland’s 23 other counties, saying he believes there are thousands of non-citizens registered to vote statewide.
“This is the first inning in a nine inning lawsuit,” McDonough told MarylandReporter.com. “There is no question we’ve uncovered major fraud… Folks that are non-citizens that are thinking about voting in this election, when this story breaks, I think they are going to have second thoughts because they know the prosecutor is going to be looking into these votes. So this may be beneficial in trying to promote a fair election.”
Maryland’s legislature is out of session until January, but McDonough has pre-filed the Voter Discovery Act to require Maryland court clerks to report people who use non-citizenship to avoid jury duty. Jurors in Maryland are selected from state voter rolls.
Non-citizens registering and/or voting is a crime punishable by deportation, according to federal law.