A software failure inside New Jersey’s motor vehicle system opened the door for hundreds of non-citizens to cast ballots in state elections, Governor Mikie Sherrill revealed Tuesday, triggering a political firestorm that quickly pivoted toward President Trump.
The scale of the breakdown is significant.
Between June 2023 and June 2024, a glitch at the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission automatically enrolled nearly 6,600 non-citizens as eligible voters.
Of that group, approximately 400 individuals actually cast ballots, according to Sherrill.
What makes the failure particularly striking is that the system ignored applicants’ own answers.
Individuals seeking driver’s licenses or state ID cards told the keypad system “no” when asked whether they were U.S. citizens. Despite that response, the system registered them to vote anyway.
Those who voted illegally were not confined to one political camp or geographic pocket.
Sherrill said the 400 illegal voters registered as Democrats, Republicans, and unaffiliated voters, and were dispersed across New Jersey rather than clustered in a single district.
Sherrill declined to specify which races or municipalities were touched by the illegal votes. She maintained that “we have no evidence at this time that any elections were swayed.”
That assurance carries added weight given New Jersey’s electoral history.
Ballotpedia data shows the state has seen 13 elections since 2017 decided by ten votes or fewer, underscoring how narrow margins can be in Garden State contests.
New Jersey’s automatic registration system is not unique.
It is one of 23 states, along with the District of Columbia, that automatically registers residents through motor vehicle offices, shifting the burden onto individuals to actively opt out if they do not wish to be registered.
Behind the malfunctioning software sits IDEMIA, a French company identified by the New Jersey Globe as the vendor responsible for the error.
IDEMIA also owns the firm that provides identity verification services for TSA PreCheck and other federal programs.
The timing of Sherrill’s admission is notable.
It came roughly a week after President Trump used a prime-time national address to claim nearly 250,000 non-citizens were registered to vote across California, New Jersey, Nevada, and Pennsylvania, with New Jersey’s total allegedly reaching as high as 35,152.
Sherrill confirmed she received formal correspondence from the Department of Homeland Security citing that identical 35,152 figure.
She said her administration has repeatedly sought documentation to back up the number. “We have asked them for any evidence of this, where they got that number, who this is. We’ve received nothing back yet,” Sherrill said.
Rather than dwelling solely on the failure, Sherrill used the press conference to go on offense against the president.
Asked whether Trump might point to New Jersey as proof that elections nationwide are vulnerable, she responded, “I think that Donald Trump has done more to undermine free elections in this country than certainly anyone in my lifetime, including Vladimir Putin.” She added that Trump “has zero credibility on the issue of election integrity.”
The White House did not let that characterization stand unanswered.
Spokesperson Abigail Jackson told The New York Post that New Jersey’s admission vindicates years of Republican warnings.
“Democrats and their media allies have repeatedly said it is impossible for noncitizens to register to vote, let alone cast a ballot. Time and again, they have been proven wrong,” Jackson said.
The administration used the moment to renew its push for the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, legislation that would require citizenship proof and photo identification for voter registration nationwide.
Sherrill turned some of her criticism inward toward Trenton’s past leadership, though she avoided naming former Governor Phil Murphy directly.
“It’s unacceptable that no one in the previous administration brought this to light, demanded accountability, or took action when it happened years ago,” she said, adding that “the trend playbook has been to avoid tackling and solving tough problems.”
She was careful to distinguish her own tenure from the origins of the failure.
“This failure didn’t occur under my watch, but accountability starts now because the people of New Jersey shouldn’t have to wait a year for a problem to get solved, or two years to learn it even happened,” Sherrill said.
To address the fallout, Sherrill’s office has retained CSG Law, an independent firm, to investigate how the failure occurred and persisted undetected.
State officials also plan to switch software vendors as early as next year, notify affected individuals by letter, and remove ineligible names from the voter rolls.
Sherrill framed the response as consistent with her broader record of public service.
“I’ve taken several oaths to support and defend our Constitution as a Navy pilot, a federal prosecutor, and an elected official. Election integrity is core to that oath. It’s my duty as governor to make sure our elections are free, fair, and secure,” she said.
New Jersey’s scandal lands amid a broader Republican push in Washington for stricter election safeguards.
The House is set to vote this week on legislation combining a ban on congressional stock trading with new voter ID requirements.
Both chambers are also preparing to consider a reconciliation bill blueprint containing a scaled-back version of the SAVE America Act.
On Tuesday, House Republicans cleared a procedural hurdle advancing three separate legislative tracks tied to the measure, including the voter ID provision, the reconciliation framework, and a proposal pairing the bill with defense authorization legislation.
