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Iowa aware of only handful of improper votes of 1.6M ballots

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February 12th, 2017 by Ric Hanson

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) — Iowa’s top elections official, who is pushing for a voter identification requirement that could make it harder for some to vote, has only been informed of 10 votes that were potentially improper out of 1.6 million cast statewide.

A summary of “general election irregularities” obtained by The Associated Press shows Iowa Secretary of State Paul Pate’s office learned of a handful of cases of alleged double-voting and votes cast by ineligible felons on Election Day.

Further review by AP shows most of the instances were mistakes rather than fraud, and may not have been stopped by an identification requirement.

They included a non-English speaking citizen who mistakenly voted when he registered and again on Election Day, and a felon whose voting rights had been restored in Wisconsin but not Iowa.