CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Secretary of State Mac Warner is working with all 55 county clerks to clean up voter rolls in the Mountain State. The office has removed 47,490 names off the lists since Warner took office in mid-January.
“There are a lot of people who have moved, changed names, gotten married, deceased — there are a number of reasons why these files have extra names on there,” Warner explained on Tuesday’s MetroNews “Talkline.”
Of the total removed names, 1,170 were convicted felons who lost their right to vote upon conviction.
West Virginia had at least three counties that had more registered voters than they did people eligible to vote, Warner said.
In one county that Warner declined to identify, nearly 9,000 names were removed from the voter list. The number of voters in that county dropped from 22,000 to 13,000 from the time former Secretary of State Natalie Tennant was in office until now.
As of Tuesday, there were 1,233,702 registered voters in the state.
Warner said his campaign promise was to clean up the voter rolls before the next election.
“You’re going to have a higher voter turn out when you remove those names that are deceased, moved or so forth,” he said. “It’s going to restore confidence in the election.”
A seven-member Field Services Team is currently working with county clerks as well as with city clerks and recorders to identify names that should not be on their lists.