Were illegals let into the country so that they could vote for Biden?
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Executive summary
There is no credible evidence that undocumented immigrants were deliberately allowed into the United States so they could vote for President Biden; multiple reputable investigations and election experts find noncitizen voting in federal elections to be vanishingly rare and claims to the contrary are rooted in partisan misinformation and faulty data-matching [1] [2] [3]. Republican officials and media allies continue to allege a coordinated scheme, and some federal tools have flagged possible noncitizen registrants — but follow-up reviews show tiny numbers and frequent false positives, not a coordinated mass enfranchisement effort [4] [1] [5].
1. The core claim and why it matters: a political narrative, not an established fact
The allegation that the Biden administration intentionally let in migrants so they could be added to voter rolls and vote is a political narrative promoted by Trump allies and some Republican officials; outlets such as AP and PBS report these claims as part of a broader right-wing campaign to delegitimize elections rather than as conclusions supported by evidence [5] [6]. The claim matters because it undercuts public confidence in elections and has driven state and federal actions — including demands for massive voter data sharing with federal agencies — despite lacking corroborating proof [4] [7].
2. What independent reviews and experts actually find: rare occurrences, not mass fraud
Longstanding academic and legal work shows that noncitizen voting in federal elections is extremely rare, with extensive studies and post‑2020 litigation finding no evidence of systemic illegal voting sufficient to change outcomes; watchdogs and legal cases repeatedly rejected broad claims of widespread fraud [2] [8] [9]. Recent uses of DHS’s SAVE verification tool by states produced only small numbers of potential noncitizen flags, and local election officials who examined those flags commonly found errors or a handful of isolated cases — not a coordinated mass of illegal voters admitted to sway the 2024 election [4] [1].
3. Data tools, false positives and how they get weaponized
The SAVE database and other cross‑checks can flag mismatches between voter registration rolls and federal immigration records, but they were never intended as a final adjudication of citizenship and have produced false positives — for example, counties finding dozens flagged names where many later proved to be citizens or clerical errors [4] [1]. Those technical mismatches have been amplified into sweeping accusations by political actors despite the databases’ limitations, according to election experts and fact‑checkers [4] [6].
4. The opposing case and its limits: allegations without proportional evidence
Republican leaders and commentators have reiterated versions of the charge — that Democrats benefit politically from lax border policies — and some officials pushed for aggressive data demands and investigations [4] [5]. However, prominent investigations and independent news reporting have so far returned negligible numbers of actual illegal votes and numerous explanations for those numbers that do not involve a deliberate enfranchisement scheme, including administrative error or mistaken registration [1] [10].
5. Anatomy of the misinformation problem and what remains uncertain
Scholars of misinformation and election law emphasize that repeating unproven allegations about noncitizen voting fuels voter suppression and political polarization, even when courts and studies repeatedly find no systemic issue [11] [2]. Reporting reliably shows the absence of evidence for a coordinated plan to admit migrants to vote, but available sources cannot speak to every individual administrative decision at the border — they do, however, show no proof that any such admissions were intended to produce illegal votes for Biden [1] [7].
Bottom line
Available, credible reporting and research conclude there is no substantiated evidence that undocumented migrants were deliberately allowed into the country so they could vote for President Biden; instead, the assertions rest on politicized interpretations of flawed database matches and partisan narratives that independent reviews have not corroborated [1] [2] [4].