OUTRAGE: Jocelyn Benson’s Election Bureau Moves to KILL Michigan Proof-of-Citizenship and Photo ID Ballot Measure After “Random” 1,000-Signature Sample Leaves Petition Just 17 Valid Signatures Short — Despite 709,841 Collected

Michigan Secretary of State and candidate for MI Governor speaks at UAW event.

Democrat-aligned election officials have effectively killed a popular citizen-led ballot initiative that would have required proof of U.S. citizenship and a photo ID to vote.

Americans for Citizen Voting–Michigan submitted a staggering 709,841 signatures supporting its proposed constitutional amendment, more than 263,000 above the 446,198-signature requirement.

But the Michigan Bureau of Elections, operating under Democrat Secretary of State and gubernatorial candidate Jocelyn Benson, is now recommending that the petition be declared “insufficient.”

The recommendation is based on a statistical review of only 1,000 randomly selected signatures from the more than 709,000 submitted.

According to the Bureau’s official 13-page staff report, election workers initially determined that 692 of the 1,000 sampled signatures were valid.

That number would have been more than enough for certification.

Then came a challenge filed by attorney Robert LaBrant and the left-wing voting organization Promote the Vote Action.

The organization challenged 377 signatures in the sample. Of those, 217 had already been rejected during the Bureau’s initial review, leaving challenges against another 160 signatures that staff originally considered valid.

After processing those challenges, the number of accepted signatures plunged from 692 to 607. The campaign responded with evidence seeking to restore 149 signatures, but Bureau staff reinstated only five.

The final count was 612 valid signatures. The campaign needed 629.

That means the fate of a statewide constitutional amendment supported by more than 709,000 Michigan residents could come down to how bureaucrats treated just 17 signatures in a 1,000-name sample.

Based on that sample, the Bureau estimated that the petition contained 434,423 valid signatures, 11,775 below the required 446,198.

The Bureau therefore recommended that the Board of State Canvassers declare the petition insufficient.

In other words, officials did not individually determine that the campaign lacked 446,198 valid signatures. They projected that conclusion across the entire petition using a sample representing roughly 0.14% of the signatures submitted.

This is how Democrats kill election integrity measures they cannot defeat at the ballot box. More than 700,000 Michiganders signed the petitions.

Democrat staffers and their allies then nitpicked a tiny sample, invalidated signatures over technicalities such as city/township mismatches, date issues, illegibility, or circulator information, and declared the whole effort dead.

“Our petitions were submitted more than four months before the deadline, yet here we are at the last minute being told they should not be certified,” said Kurt O’Keefe, the initiative’s treasurer.

“We spent months reviewing these petitions, removing duplicates and discarding signatures we believed might not comply with Michigan law. We are confident we submitted significantly more than the 446,198 valid signatures required.”

Americans for Citizen Voting–Michigan spokeswoman Kristin Combs vowed that the campaign would continue fighting.

“The fight continues. More than 700,000 Michiganders signed our petition. They deserve a vote.”

She is absolutely right.

The proposed amendment would have required voters to prove citizenship with documents such as a passport or birth certificate, mandated photo ID (or provisional ballots with follow-up documentation), created a statewide citizenship verification program, and ordered the removal of noncitizens from the Qualified Voter File after notice and a response window.

It also included a state-funded hardship program for those who cannot afford the documents. Starting after the 2026 election, unverified citizenship would have blocked counting of ballots unless documentation was provided promptly.

The petition has not yet been formally rejected. Michigan’s four-member Board of State Canvassers, two Republicans and two Democrats, is scheduled to make its final determination on August 24, according to the official board schedule.

The controversy comes as Michigan’s election system faces mounting scrutiny over noncitizens allegedly registering and voting.

As The Gateway Pundit previously reported, Democrat Attorney General Dana Nessel recently charged five noncitizens accused of illegally registering or voting in the 2024 election. A sixth defendant, a U.S. citizen, was charged with allegedly registering her noncitizen husband.

The Gateway Pundit also reported in May that six noncitizens appearing on the Department of Homeland Security’s “Worst of the Worst” criminal-alien list were registered to vote in Michigan, with records indicating that two had participated in multiple elections.

And just this week, The Gateway Pundit reported that Barry County Sheriff Dar Leaf said a Secretary of State whistleblower alleged that noncitizens could be automatically added to Michigan’s voter rolls after changing their addresses. Leaf said the allegations were referred to the Justice Department for investigation.

The post OUTRAGE: Jocelyn Benson’s Election Bureau Moves to KILL Michigan Proof-of-Citizenship and Photo ID Ballot Measure After “Random” 1,000-Signature Sample Leaves Petition Just 17 Valid Signatures Short — Despite 709,841 Collected appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.