NC congressman says Biden is recruiting illegal votes. Here are the facts | Opinion

U.S. Rep. Greg Murphy made a wildly absurd claim on social media this week, alleging that Joe Biden is intentionally leaving the U.S. border open so that undocumented immigrants can come into the country and vote.

“The REAL voter fraud. Biden opened our Border to recruit illegal aliens to register to vote. This country is on the path of one party rule and Marxism. [America] needs to wake up,” Murphy, a North Carolina Republican, wrote in a post on X/Twitter.

As ridiculous as this statement is, it’s actually become a fairly common talking point among Republicans, and versions of it have been repeated by the likes of Donald Trump and Elon Musk. It’s also not new: Trump has long claimed that his 2020 loss was caused by illegal votes in states like Arizona, and that he only lost the popular vote to Hillary Clinton in 2016 because millions of people voted illegally. (Both were proven to be false.)

However, the Biden administration is not “importing votes.”

For one, it can take a decade or longer for an immigrant to become a U.S. citizen, which means it would be 10 years before they are even able to register to vote. Even once an immigrant obtains a green card and becomes a lawful permanent resident, it can take years before they are eligible for citizenship. By the time that happens, Biden would no longer be running for office — and it’s silly to speculate what the political leanings of a person or group of people will be a decade from now.

It’s illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections under federal law, of course, and it carries hefty punishments, including deportation or imprisonment.

There is very little evidence of non-citizen voting in federal elections, and it certainly is not so widespread that it could legitimately swing the outcome of a presidential election. For example, 19 people in North Carolina faced voter fraud charges for voting in the 2016 election despite not being citizens. The total number of North Carolinians who voted in the 2016 election was 4.6 million.

Suggesting — without evidence — that millions of people might be able to get away with voting illegally is the kind of dangerous statement that sows distrust in election officials and the electoral process.

Even if someone registers to vote while they aren’t eligible, it does not mean that they will be able to actually vote. A similar fact-check from The Washington Post noted that, in Georgia, 1,634 people over 25 years had attempted to register to vote even though they were not U.S. citizens. However, none were actually permitted to register to vote and therefore never cast a ballot. And, according to PolitiFact, fraudulent voter registration or voting by noncitizens is often a “result of misunderstandings or errors.” For example, some people mistakenly end up on the voter rolls when getting a driver’s license or visiting the DMV.

Finally, while it is true that migrant encounters at the southern border have reached an all time high, there is no “open border.” The term suggests that anyone can simply walk across the border and take up residency in the U.S. In reality, not every “encounter” with U.S. Border Patrol results in a migrant being released or allowed into the country. Millions of migrants encountered at the border are returned, expelled or deported.