07/27/2026
No. It is illegal for non-citizens (including undocumented/“illegal” immigrants, green-card holders, and temporary visa holders) to vote in U.S. federal elections or in statewide elections. Federal law has explicitly prohibited this since the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. Violations can bring fines, up to a year in prison, deportation, and immigration consequences such as inadmissibility.2
No state allows non-citizens to vote in statewide races. A small number of localities (municipalities in California, Maryland, and Vermont, plus Washington, D.C.) permit non-citizens to vote in certain local elections only—such as school board, city council, or mayor—under local rules. These do not affect federal or state contests.21
Scale of illegal non-citizen voting
Documented cases exist and are prosecuted, but multiple audits, official reviews, and studies (including from sources across the spectrum) find it is extremely rare and has not been shown to affect outcomes of federal or statewide elections:
• Heritage Foundation’s voter-fraud database has catalogued dozens of proven non-citizen voting cases over roughly two decades (e.g., ~23–99 depending on the exact timeframe and criteria cited).
• A Brennan Center review of 42 jurisdictions in 2016 found suspected non-citizen votes at about 0.0001% of total ballots.
• State audits routinely turn up small numbers of non-citizens on voter rolls (sometimes hundreds or a few thousand after cross-checks with immigration databases), of whom a fraction have voted. Examples include removals and referrals in Texas, Virginia, Ohio, Georgia, Louisiana, New Jersey, and others; recent federal charges in New Jersey involved a handful of individuals who voted while non-citizens.1
Registration systems rely heavily on self-attestation of citizenship (often under penalty of perjury). Errors, outdated records after naturalization, or intentional fraud can place non-citizens on rolls. States and the federal government periodically clean rolls and prosecute cases; some recent DOJ efforts have focused on identifying and removing non-citizens from lists.
Claims of “millions” of non-citizen votes lack supporting evidence from election officials, academic studies, or large-scale audits. Isolated academic papers (e.g., one analyzing survey data from ~2008–2010) have estimated higher rates, but those findings have been heavily debated and do not match the pattern of verified cases from official sources.
In short: Non-citizen voting in federal and state elections is banned, carries serious penalties, occurs at very low rates when it happens at all, and is actively investigated when detected. Local exceptions are narrow and limited to specific municipal races.
