House Republicans want Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson to do more to clear Michigan’s bloated voter rolls of ineligible voters.

After years of resistance from Benson to proactively purge voters who have died, moved or otherwise became ineligible, state Rep. Mike Hoadley, R-Au Gres, introduced legislation on Wednesday to force her into action.

“The inaccuracy of Michigan’s voter rolls is a legitimate concern,” Hoadley said in a statement. “Inaccurate information in the (Qualified Voter File) can undermine voter confidence in the system. After failed lawsuits to clean up the rolls, my bill simply instructs the Secretary of State to send postage to a voter to verify the most accurate voter information is on file.”

House Bill 4356 would task Benson’s office with contacting by mail registered voters who have not cast a ballot in a decade “within 180 days after each general November election.”

The mailing must include “a postage prepaid and preaddressed return card to the appropriate city or township clerk on which the elector may verify the elector’s current address information and on which the elector must sign the elector’s name.”

The mailing would also include a notice that informs the inactive voter that if they “do not complete, sign, and return the enclosed card to the appropriate city or township clerk at least 15 days before the next election, you will be required to affirm your current address at the polls before you are permitted to vote.”

The bill reads: “If a notice sent … is returned to the secretary of state by the post office as undeliverable, the secretary of state shall identify the registration card of that elector as challenged as provided in this act. If the elector does not vote or engage in voting-related activity by the first business day after the second general November election that is held after the date on the notice, the secretary of state shall cancel the registration of that elector and notify the appropriate city or township clerk of the cancellation.”

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The legislation follows a recent admission by Benson, who is running her own election to replace a term-limited Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2026, that at least 16 noncitizens voted in the 2024 election, and those illegal votes negated legal votes because there’s no means to retrieve them.

Benson has vigorously defended against multiple lawsuits in recent years that take issue with how she manages the state’s Qualified Voter File, which currently includes registrations that number about 105% of the state’s voting age population. Michigan is the only state in the Great Lakes region with more registered voters than legal voters.

When Benson took office, the state’s voter rolls sat at 7.5 million, or about 300,000 fewer than a voting age population of about 7.8 million. Four years later, the state had added 700,000 registrations – many automatically through driver’s license renewals – swelling the voter rolls to 8.2 million for a voting age population of 7.9 million.

An investigation by the Public Interest Legal Foundation, which filed a lawsuit against Benson in 2021 over the issue, highlighted numerous registered Michigan voters who died decades ago.

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The Republican National Committee also filed a lawsuit last year, alleging failure to remove nearly 500,000 ineligible voters violates the National Voting Rights Act.

“The RNC and its members are concerned that Defendants’ failure to comply with the NVRA’s voter-list maintenance obligations undermines the integrity of elections by increasing the opportunity for ineligible voters or voters intent on fraud to cast ballots,” the lawsuit reads.

While courts have sided with Benson’s assertion she’s making reasonable efforts to remove ineligible voters, the state’s swollen voter rolls continue to fuel concerns about cheating, forcing Benson to repeatedly address the issue.

The secretary of state contends “active” voters on the QVF number closer to 7.3 million, and alleged federal election law prevents inactive voters from being removed without clear evidence or a request from the voter themselves.

“Michigan has approximately 7.3 million active registered voters and a total voting age population of about 7.9 million citizens. The state’s Qualified Voter File (QVF) currently includes approximately 577,000 inactive registrations that are slated for cancellation as well as about 600,000 inactive voter registrations belonging to voters who have not cast a ballot in the last six years and who may have died or moved,” according to a recent statement from the Secretary of State.

“State and federal law require these inactive registrations to remain in the QVF unless election officials receive reliable information that the voter is no longer eligible to vote, which could include the voter surrendering a Michigan driver’s license to another state or election mail sent to the voter being returned to their clerk as undeliverable by the U.S. Postal Service,” the statement read.

Benson has campaigned against efforts in both the Michigan Legislature and Congress to require proof of citizenship to register to vote, and photo identification to cast a ballot.

In March, Detroit community leaders Ramon Jackson and Pastor Lorenzo Sewel testified in the House Election Integrity Committee that Benson and Attorney General Dana Nessel “refuse to take action” and “eventually just stopped returning our calls” when they uncovered systemic voter fraud in the Motor City.

Jackson explained he and other Detroit activists first uncovered the fraud after securing a voting list for District 3 from the 2022 election amid an effort to recall a city council member.

“I seen my friend on the list who I know had moved out of Detroit, who I know don’t vote,” he testified, adding that he confirmed as much with the friend. “He had lived in Detroit 47 years, he had never been registered to vote, he ain’t never voted in his life.”

Voter records show the friend cast absentee ballots in four elections on a straight Democratic ticket. Jackson later realized the same thing with his own voting history after moving from Detroit.

“There are dozens of others who meet this pattern; fraudulently listed as registered voters and fake votes cast on behalf of these voters,” Jackson previously told The Midwesterner.

Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office responded to Jackson’s federal lawsuit and alleged all of those voters detailed in the complaint were registered to vote through driver’s license transactions, Jackson said.

“What we discovered is that they’re preying on people with low or no voter history who’re transitioning, moving place to place in Detroit, unstable housing, and then when they move out of Detroit, we are being registered back to Detroit unlawfully without our knowledge, and they’re saying this is being done through a driver’s license transaction,” he said.

Those transactions were not conducted by the folks who were registered to vote, Jackson said.

“Michigan residents want to be confident in our voter rolls again,” Hoadley said. “It’s time we work together to start cleaning up this mess and get our ducks in a row.”