Judicial Watch Update: New Numbers Show Over Five Million Names Cleaned from Voter Rolls Nationwide

Kentucky Removes 735,000 from Voter Rolls since 2019, NYC Removals Now Total 918,139

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that its analysis and use of voter registration lists has led to lawsuits and legal actions under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) that have resulted in the removal of five million names from voter rolls in nearly a dozen states and localities over the last several years.

Recently, the Commonwealth of Kentucky reported that 735,000 ineligible voter registrations have been removed from its voter rolls since 2019 by the State Board of Elections as part of its 2018 consent decree settling a lawsuit by Judicial Watch. 

As part of its 2022 settlement, New York City alone has removed 918,139 ineligible names from its rolls: recent data show 477,056 removals between March 2023 and February 2025, which is in addition to the 441,083 previously reported removals.

These latest developments come as a result of Judicial Watch’s 2017 lawsuit against Kentucky under the NVRA (Judicial Watch, Inc. and the United States of America v. Alison Lundergan Grimes, et al. (No. 3:17-cv-00094)) and its 2022 lawsuit against New York City that pointed out that it had removed only 22 names under the federal law over six years (Judicial Watch v Valentine et al. (No.1:22-cv-03952)).

In 2018, the U.S. Supreme Court confirmed that such removals are mandatory.

In May 2022, Los Angeles County confirmed the removal of 1.2 million ineligible names from its rolls as part of a settlement in a federal lawsuit Judicial Watch filed in 2017. (Legal pressure from Judicial Watch ultimately has led to the removal of ineligible names from voter rolls in New York, California, Pennsylvania, Colorado, North Carolina, Kentucky, and Ohio.)

Other voter roll clean-up lawsuits by Judicial Watch continue in Illinois, Oregon, and California.

“Judicial Watch’s clean-up of over five million dirty names from voter rolls is a historic achievement for clean elections. I have no doubt that Judicial Watch’s election integrity heavy lifting helped stop the steal in 2024,” stated Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “But there are millions of more names to be removed from voting rolls, which is why we are in federal court in three states.”

Judicial Watch is a national leader in voting integrity and voting rights.

Recently, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit declined to rehear its previous ruling in which it agreed with Judicial Watch that it was unlawful for Mississippi to count ballots that arrived after Election Day.

Judicial Watch in March 2025 filed a federal lawsuit against California on behalf of U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa to prevent state election officials from extending Election Day for seven days beyond the date established by federal law. California counts ballots received up to seven days after Election Day.

Also in March, Judicial Watch sent a notice letter to Lt. Governor Deidre M. Henderson, notifying her that Utah is currently in violation of the NVRA’s public disclosure requirements. The notice letter warns of a lawsuit after 90 days if the issues are not resolved.

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