Payam Javan: North Carolina has removed more than 747,000 voters from its rolls since the start of 2023 due to ineligibility, according to an announcement by the state’s elections board on September 26. The purge, which ended in August, involved removing an average of 1,200 names per day, resulting in a significant update to the state’s voter records. Voters were removed for various reasons, including death, relocation, felony convictions, and inactivity. Of the removals, nearly 290,000 were due to duplicate registrations, while 246,311 were for inactivity in recent federal elections and 130,688 for death. Despite the purge, the state still has over 7.7 million registered voters.

As a swing state, North Carolina is expected to play a crucial role in the upcoming presidential election, and it has already become a focal point for election-related lawsuits. In August, the Republican National Committee and the North Carolina Republican Party sued the state’s elections board, alleging violations of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA). The lawsuit claims that the board failed to collect essential identifying information from over 225,000 voter registrants, potentially compromising election integrity. Additionally, the GOP is contesting the board’s decision to allow digital student IDs from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as valid voter identification.

In a separate legal battle, the North Carolina elections board faced a lawsuit from former independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., resulting in his name being removed from the state’s ballot by the North Carolina Supreme Court. Kennedy, who suspended his campaign in August, has since aligned himself with Republican candidate Donald Trump. The state’s election landscape continues to evolve as legal challenges shape the upcoming election process.