Secretaries of state from Arizona, Florida, Ohio, Michigan, New Mexico, and West Virginia appeared before the House Administration Committee for a hearing titled “American Confidence in Elections: Looking Ahead to the 2024 General Election.” 

Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, a Republican, told the Washington Examiner in an interview after the hearing that he believes he and his Democratic counterparts are “speaking two different languages.”

“It seemed like my minority colleagues were focusing exclusively on why they need more money from Washington to do this job,” LaRose said. “I don’t think that’s necessarily where the focus needs to be, but the fact is that we can run elections that are both secure and convenient.”

During opening statements, Republican secretaries of state focused on what procedures are already in place to ensure confidence, as well as arguing instances of election interference in the 2020 election. On the other side, Democratic secretaries of state focused on the safety of election workers and how perpetuating false fraud claims could be dangerous and damaging to election integrity.

The hearing comes just one day after former President Donald Trump walked back his admission that he lost the 2020 election “by a whisker” during the presidential debate with Vice President Kamala Harris. Several Republicans on and off Capitol Hill have urged the former president to steer away from debunked claims that the last presidential election was stolen, a controversial opinion that led to the GOP underperforming in the 2022 midterm elections.

Many of the secretaries noted that they have worked hard to make sure voter registration is accurate, removing anywhere from 500 noncitizens in Ohio to up to 800,000 ineligible voters in Michigan from voter rolls.

Hovering over the hearing and mentioned by a few of the GOP secretaries was the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE, Act — a messaging bill championed by hard-line Republicans that would bar noncitizens from voting in federal elections, which is already illegal. However, GOP lawmakers have argued the SAVE Act can help boost state election divisions’ abilities to keep elections free from fraud. 

Republican leadership had to pull a continuing resolution with the SAVE Act attached from the House floor on Wednesday afternoon after it was clear the measure would not have enough votes to pass the lower chamber. 

One aspect of voting integrity mentioned was the use of the SAVE database, which is a Department of Homeland Security service used to verify immigration statuses and acquired U.S. citizenship. LaRose confirmed in the hearing that using the database and cross-referencing with the state motor vehicle database helped the election division find and remove noncitizens from Ohio’s voter rolls. 

Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, argued that using the SAVE database in the way used by Ohio is unnecessary due to the audits that her team conducts to verify voters —  a comment House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil (R-WI) took issue with, particularly when she said that voters are “essentially verified” at registration because they have to provide some form of identification.

Benson took several hits from Republicans on Wednesday over a voter registration program partnership between Michigan and the Small Business Administration. GOP lawmakers have blasted the outreach program as a political ploy to garner support for President Joe Biden in a battleground state that could decide who takes the White House in November.

“These agencies are using our taxpayer dollars to put forward a partisan get-out-the-vote effort, and they won’t provide the strategic plan,” Steil said. “This administration, the Biden administration, continues to hide the strategic plan from every taxpayer in this country, and I think that does not encourage people to have more confidence in their elections.”

Rep. Stephanie Bice (R-OK) asked the Republican secretaries of state whether they had been contacted to participate in any federal agency get-out-the-vote programs.

“We have not, and we have not had any evidence or reports of federal agencies in Florida doing that,” Florida Secretary of State Cord Byrd said. “And if they were to request, we wouldn’t allow them.”

LaRose responded and said that he led an effort to sue the Biden administration over the executive order, “so I think they know better than to ask me.”

Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-NY) noted the millions of illegal immigrants crossing into the United States from the southern border, arguing that “we would be lying to ourselves to think that some of them are not going to take the opportunity to vote.” All of the secretaries said that, with their states often having razor-thin margins in their elections, every vote counts and there is “zero tolerance” for noncitizen voting. 

“In 2000, 537 votes separated President [George W.] Bush from Sen. [Al] Gore,” Byrd said. “Small numbers matter in elections. Our current speaker of the House lost his first race by two votes. If there were three illegal votes, that is overwhelming to his race.”

While agreeing with her counterparts, Benson pushed back on claims that there is widespread fraud in every election.

“There’s no evidence that noncitizens are voting,” Benson said. “If they were, it would be easy to prove since voting records are public, and despite numerous organizations and money to try to convince people that noncitizens are voting, none of these groups have actually been able to provide any evidence of it.”

The Ohio secretary of state acknowledged in the interview with the Washington Examiner that there is “broad agreement” across the political spectrum that noncitizens shouldn’t vote in U.S. elections, but “the question comes down to enforcement.”

“So, this is, I guess, where we disagree,” LaRose said. “I hear people say all the time, ‘Why are you still talking about noncitizen voting? That’s already illegal.’ OK, we’re not talking about making it illegal. It’s already illegal. We’re talking about enforcing the law.”

“I made the quip in committee that it is illegal to hijack airplanes. That doesn’t mean we abolish the TSA,” the Ohio secretary continued on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. “Of course, we have to have mechanisms in place to make sure that the law is enforced.”