CONGRESSWOMAN TENNEY CALLS ON DOJ TO INVESTIGATE NEW YORK'S PLAN TO USE MEDICAID FOR AUTOMATIC VOTER REGISTRATION

The following information was released by the office of New York Rep. Claudia Tenney:

Congresswoman Claudia Tenney (NY-24) sent a letter to Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche calling for a federal review of New York State Senate Bill S88A, legislation that would require New York's Medicaid program to automatically register applicants and enrollees to vote unless they opt out.

In her letter, Tenney raised serious concerns that New York's deeply flawed Medicaid enrollment verification systems could lead to improper voter registration and undermine election integrity.

Tenney's letter cites a September 2025 New York State Comptroller audit that found approximately $509 million in Medicaid managed care premiums were paid on behalf of over 155,000 individuals that may have resided outside New York State. The audit also found that hundreds of thousands of enrollees were not properly submitted for federal data matching due to data integrity failures.

The letter also highlights that New York's Medicaid and related health coverage programs serve large populations of noncitizens, both legally and illegally present, that are ineligible to vote in federal elections, making strong verification safeguards essential before any voter registration data transfer occurs.

Tenney requested that the Department of Justice evaluate whether the legislation complies with federal voter roll maintenance requirements and whether sufficient safeguards exist to prevent improper voter registration.

"New York Democrats want to use a taxpayer-funded Medicaid system already plagued by verification failures to automatically register voters," said Congresswoman Tenney. "State audits have already exposed serious failures in New York's Medicaid enrollment and residency verification infrastructure. Using this same broken bureaucracy for voter registration creates an unacceptable risk of ineligible individuals being added to the voter rolls, compromising the integrity of our elections. New Yorkers deserve secure elections and confidence that our election laws are being enforced."