Orange County supervisors split over turning unredacted voter records over to DOJ

A divided Orange County Board of Supervisors on Aug. 26 rejected a motion to direct the Registrar of Voters to provide unredacted voter-registration records for 17 named registrants to the U.S. Department of Justice, after a heated public-comment period and hours of legal and policy argument.

The motion, moved by Supervisor Don Wagner and seconded by a colleague, drew backing from members who said cooperating with federal investigators would help ‘‘clean the rolls.’’ Supervisor Wagner told colleagues, “We are being sued by the Department of Justice,” and urged cooperation so the county could resolve questions about registrations and avoid extended litigation. The motion failed on a roll call: 2 in favor, 3 opposed.

Registrar Bob Page told the board that voter-file maintenance is a continuous, daily process and said the county cancels inactive registrants after the statutorily required steps. “After this last general election in November, we ended up canceling about a 176,000 inactive voters,” he said, describing routine removals and statutory procedures the office follows.

County Counsel emphasized the narrow legal posture of the case and the confidentiality limits under state law, noting that “the registrar of voters is the defendant in the case, not the board or the county” and explaining that the office had offered redacted records and offered protective-order options to DOJ. Counsel added that the litigation is at issue and that the county has proposed confidentiality protections that the DOJ has not accepted.

Vice Chair Katrina Foley framed the disagreement as largely procedural and statutory, saying statutes including federal provisions and California elections-code sections restrict disclosure of certain identifiers. Foley summarized the legal path: a court would need to order disclosure for unredacted confidential fields to be turned over without exposing the county to legal risk.

Several public commenters urged transparency and faster cooperation with federal investigators; other speakers warned about privacy and identity-theft risks from disclosing sensitive identifiers. District Attorney Todd Spitzer told the board his office will investigate credible referrals for fraudulent voting but said prosecutions are relatively uncommon and typically depend on solid evidence.

The board had debated whether to supply the full unredacted files, offer redacted records under protective order, or ask the DOJ to obtain a court order. After roll call, Chair Doug Chaffee, Vice Chair Foley and Supervisor Sarmiento voted no; Supervisors Wagner and Wynne voted yes, and the motion did not carry.

Next steps discussed included (1) continuing discussions between the Registrar, County Counsel and the DOJ to seek a protective-order solution; (2) the Registrar providing a written memo on routine roll-maintenance practices and counts; and (3) continuing active cleanup of the voter file under state processes. The board did not adopt new binding directions to the Registrar regarding the pending DOJ request.