Co-chair Trey Grayson testified before the Mississippi House of Representatives in favor of early online voter registration:
Trey Grayson, the former Republican Secretary of State for Kentucky, also joined lawmakers for the hearing as part of the Secure Elections Project, a national nonprofit that works mostly in “red or purple states” on the elections processes. He spoke to online voter registration.
Mississippi does not currently allow first-time online voter registration. Grayson said states have found that online voter registration saves money, enhances voter convenience, and is more secure than the traditional method.
“Forty-three states have gone all in, so they allow both the updating and the initial registration,” Grayson said, noting that Mississippi does allow for updating online.
He said online registrations are significantly cheaper due to the lack of paper necessary to register to vote. Grayson said it costs about 3 cents to process online registration while it costs upwards of $4 to process it on paper, which could save some $700,000 per year. Paper registration would still be available.
Grayson said online registration also cuts down on data entry errors.
As for demographics of who utilizes online voter registration, Grayson said the majority leans towards younger voters as those are who are traditionally first-time registers.