As debate continues on the national level surrounding voter ID laws, the Tar Heel State is allowing improperly-registered voters to remain on its voter rolls, at least for the time being. The North Carolina State Board of Elections recently permitted 73,000 voters to remain on the state’s voter rolls, despite failing to provide driver’s license numbers, the last four digits of their social security numbers, or an attestation that they had neither when registering to vote. The elections board is reportedly providing those improperly-registered voters time to update their information and will request the missing identification information when the voters cast their ballots in November’s midterm elections.

The move was technically part of an agreement between the Republican National Committee (RNC) and the North Carolina State Board of Elections, along with the Democratic National Committee (DNC). The RNC had alleged that the state’s elections board had, for a period of nearly two decades, failed to inform newly-registering voters that they are required to provide their driver’s license numbers or, if that number was unavailable, the last four digits of their social security numbers. When the elections board rectified the voter registration application in 2023, it did not seek the missing information from improperly-registered voters already on the rolls nor did it remove the improperly-registered voters from the state’s voter rolls.

The RNC subsequently filed a lawsuit in an effort to ensure that ballots cast by improperly-registered voters were not counted in the 2024 election. Between July and December of 2025, the number of improperly-registered voters on the state’s voter rolls fell from 103,329 to 73,064. The agreement filed in court Monday would permanently block the elections board from registering new voters without obtaining their driver’s license numbers, the last four digits of their social security numbers, or an attestation that they have neither, while requiring that the elections board continue soliciting the needed information from voters whose records are incomplete or who were improperly registered. However, the agreement also blocks the elections board from not counting the ballots of voters whose records are incomplete or who were improperly registered.

Democrats celebrated the court settlement as “a major victory for North Carolina voters” in a Tuesday press release. DNC Chairman Ken Martin accused Republicans of having “waged an all-out assault on voters in North Carolina,” adding, “This latest victory is a win for Americans and yet another blow to the Republicans’ scheme to disenfranchise voters ahead of the midterm elections.”

The court agreement between the RNC and both the North Carolina State Board of Elections and the DNC comes less than a week after the U.S. House of Representatives passed the SAVE America Act, which would require voters to present photo ID in order to vote and to provide proof of citizenship when registering to vote. The sweeping election integrity reform bill would also mandate that states maintain their voter rolls properly, ensuring that noncitizens are not permitted to vote in federal elections. The bill is expected to face opposition in the U.S. Senate, where Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has vowed to oppose its passage, despite the popularity of voter ID requirements among the American public, including over 70% of Democratic voters. An earlier version of the legislation, simply called the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, passed in the House in April but stalled in the Senate in the face of Democratic opposition.

In comments to The Washington Stand, former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, an election integrity advocate and former Department of Homeland Security (DHS) senior official during President Donald Trump’s first administration, pointed to the over-73,000 improperly-registered North Carolina voters as evidence that the SAVE America Act is necessary.

“When people on the Left screech that there are no problems with our elections, then let 73,000 improperly-registered voters remain on the voter rolls, Americans see clearly that the Democrats don’t seem to care about the security of our elections,” he said. “Why on earth would you NOT solve such a huge problem when it is put before you? Sadly, it is hard to come up with any answer to that question other than that Democrats want a situation ripe for fraud,” Cuccinelli observed. “The SAVE America Act includes requirements to clean up voter rolls that will help with these problems in the future, so I hope our senators will work through a talking filibuster to get that important bill passed!”

In recent years, the Senate has permitted the “silent filibuster,” wherein a senator indicates his intention to filibuster a piece of legislation, often resulting in that legislation not being brought to the floor. Numerous Republicans have called on Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-N.D.) to bring the legislation to the floor and compel Democrats to engage in a “talking filibuster.”

Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) explained, “The talking filibuster is different than ‘nuking’ the filibuster,” which would eliminate the 60-vote threshold needed to invoke cloture and end the Senate’s otherwise-unlimited period of debate on legislation. “The talking filibuster simply involves making people speak,” Lee pointed out. “If they want to filibuster, make them stand, make them speak. This is the best path, I believe, to getting the SAVE America Act passed out of the United States Senate and onto the president’s desk so that President Trump can sign it into law.”