How many illegal aliens voted in the last election
Executive summary
The available, credible reporting finds that noncitizen voting in the 2024 election was vanishingly rare — not the mass phenomenon some politicians and advocates have claimed — and there is no verified national tally that shows “millions” of illegal aliens voted. State audits and federal reviews have produced only small numbers of potential cases (e.g., 15 in Michigan) and preliminary federal checks flagged a modest share of registrants for follow-up, but those flags do not equate to proof of illegal ballots cast [1] [2] [3].
1. What the data actually show: tiny, documented numbers in audits and reviews
Robust, state-level post‑election checks and independent research consistently find only a handful to a few dozen proven or credible instances of noncitizen voting in modern elections; for example, Michigan’s review identified 15 credible cases out of more than 5.7 million ballots in the 2024 general election — about 0.00028% of votes cast — and referred 13 cases for potential prosecution [1]. Nationally, long‑running compilations and nonpartisan reviews highlight that proven cases across years number in the dozens, not the thousands or millions: the Bipartisan Policy Center and others summarized only a few dozen verified incidents over long periods [4] [5].
2. Federal checks flagged registrations but did not prove widespread illegal voting
A Department of Homeland Security verification exercise that matched tens of millions of voter records against immigration data yielded roughly 10,000 referrals for potential noncitizenship out of 49.5 million records processed, according to officials; the agency and Justice Department said that number represented referrals for further investigation and did not prove those people voted or were noncitizens, and some matches were later shown to be errors [2]. That distinction — flagged registrations versus proven illegal votes — is central: preliminary matches are noisy and can include naturalized citizens, record mismatches, and other false positives [2] [3].
3. Claims of mass noncitizen voting lack corroboration and conflict with scholarly work
Assertions that “millions” of unauthorized immigrants voted in 2024 have been advanced by some partisan actors and a few studies with disputed methods, but mainstream election scholars and organizations find no evidence supporting mass noncitizen voting; Migration Policy states there is no evidence that unauthorized immigrants, green‑card holders, or temporary visa holders are voting in significant numbers, and audits and studies show such voting is extremely rare [3]. The Brennan Center similarly documents that voter impersonation and noncitizen voting are virtually nonexistent and that most fraud allegations do not hold up to scrutiny [6].
4. Competing narratives and partisan incentives
Conservative groups and some political figures have pointed to databases and isolated cases compiled by groups like the Heritage Foundation and used them to argue for widespread problems, while advocates and nonpartisan researchers emphasize how few proven cases those databases contain and warn that restrictive reforms would disenfranchise eligible voters [7] [5]. High‑profile private claims — such as technology-enabled matches promoted by private actors — have been criticized by fact‑checkers and election experts for lacking transparency and for conflating preliminary matches with confirmed illegal votes [4] [2].
5. What cannot be concluded from current reporting
There is no authoritative national count that demonstrates a meaningful number of illegal ballots were cast in the 2024 election; existing official reviews show rare incidents at most, and many datasets and tools used to search for noncitizen registrants produce false positives that require follow‑up investigations [2] [1] [3]. Some analyses with dramatic estimates exist, but they are methodological outliers and have not been corroborated by audits or mainstream scholarship [8] [3].
6. Bottom line
Based on state audits, long‑term compilations, and federal review summaries, the evidence supports the conclusion that noncitizen or “illegal alien” voting in the last election was extraordinarily rare, limited to isolated cases documented by officials, and far short of the large numbers claimed in some political or partisan narratives [1] [4] [3]. Where records show thousands of potential matches, those are referrals for investigation rather than proof of illegal ballots, and independent experts and civil‑liberties groups warn against using such preliminary figures to justify broad new barriers to voting [2] [6].