Mississippi voters frustrated by surge in ‘inactive’ registrations before Election Day

JACKSON, MISS. — With Mississippi’s U.S. Senate race still too close to call, voters, grassroots pro-voting groups and election workers across the state told Democracy Docket they are deeply frustrated and concerned with the large number of voters flagged as inactive this election.

In the weeks before Election Day, likely over 200,000 voters were marked inactive after Mississippi used unverified commercial credit data to maintain its voter roll. As a result, thousands of voters had to cast affidavit — i.e., provisional — ballots this year, many of which county election officials have yet to process and count.

It’s unclear exactly how many affidavit and absentee ballots remain outstanding. But those votes will decide the state’s extremely close race between Democrat Scott Colom* and incumbent Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith. As of Sunday afternoon, Colom led Hyde-Smith by around 2,500 votes.

This year’s surge in inactive voters has put Mississippi’s highly decentralized voting system under the national microscope and has left voters discontented.

At Johnny T’s Bistro & Bar Friday, nurse practitioner Verlencia Myers said that her husband, Kristian Myers, was flagged as an inactive voter even though he has never missed an election.

“He’s been an active voter in Rankin County, Mississippi, since he was 18 years old. He’s 43. He’s never missed an election,” Verlencia said.

Kristian remained flagged as an inactive voter after he responded to a letter warning him of his inactive status and after he received a new voter registration card, Verlencia said. She added that Kristian was flagged as inactive even though they share the same address and haven’t moved in several years.

Because of his inactive status, he had to cast an affidavit ballot, which was rejected as of Friday afternoon.

“He’s gone to the courthouse — as of now — twice. We’ll be going back again today because when we checked last night, it was still saying rejected,” Verlencia said.

She added that, for many reasons, she was uncomfortable with Mississippi using credit information to scrub the voter rolls.

“I think it’s a strategic tactic. Because I think they knew they were in trouble before the election,” she said. “Like, where did they get my information from — my credit information from?”

In July 2025, Mississippi Secretary of State Michael Watson announced a new partnership with the consumer credit giant Experian to use its credit-reporting data to verify voters’ addresses while maintaining the state’s registration list.

Mississippi law requires county election officials to mark registered voters as inactive if they appear to have moved. Those voters remain inactive and are left off pollbooks until they update their registration. If they show up to vote on Election Day, they cast provisional, rather than regular, ballots.

Like most states, Mississippi used U.S. Postal Service national change-of-address data for decades to help determine whether voters have recently moved. In partnering with Experian, however, Watson introduced a new opaque dataset into the state’s list maintenance process.

Analysis by the Mississippi Today earlier this year indicated that neither Experian nor the secretary of state’s office had verified whether the data was accurate. Experts also warned that the credit reporting agency could incorrectly flag Mississippi voters as living outside the Magnolia State if a lot of their consumer activity occurs in neighboring states — a particular risk for residents of border communities.

When Watson announced the partnership, Lily Moens, the policy and research director at the grassroots voter assistance nonprofit Mississippi Votes (MSVotes), said she had immediate concerns about the accuracy of the credit data and the risk of active voters being erroneously flagged as inactive.

“It’s a system that has had proven historical inaccuracies in terms of flagging people’s addresses,” Moens said. “It’s not an accurate database.”

Moens said she was particularly worried about confusion and frustration at the polls this year from longtime active voters suddenly being asked to cast affidavit ballots. And her concerns appeared to come true during the midterms. 

Over the past week, MSVotes received at least 230 phone calls through its voter information hotline. Many were from people reporting that they had to cast affidavit ballots or seeking advice and information about the affidavit process. Around 170 of those calls came on Election Day alone.

“Voters just simply don’t know what the process means,” Jada Barnes, MSVotes’ field director, said.

It’s unclear exactly how many voters cast affidavit ballots this year, but the figure is likely in the tens of thousands. 

Being marked as inactive isn’t the only reason someone may have to cast an affidavit ballot. They may also have to if they don’t have a photo ID when they go to the polls, if they don’t appear in a precinct’s registered voter list or if election officials are unable to match a voter’s name with a citizenship database.

However, inactive flags appear to account for a significant number of affidavits this year.

Voters without a photo ID can cure their ballot by presenting acceptable ID to their local circuit clerk’s office. But inactive voters who cast affidavit ballots have no such recourse — whether their vote counts is ultimately left to county officials.

In his latest update, Watson reported that counties have so far processed 11,202 affidavits, “with roughly 78% of them being accepted.” Based on those figures, around 2,450 affidavits may have been rejected so far.

Lydia Grizzell, the policy and advocacy manager for the Mississippi affiliate of the ACLU, said she’s heard that some ballots have been rejected because poll workers did not sign the envelope in which affidavit ballots must be sealed.

“We believe the onus is not on the voter for the poll worker to sign the ballot, so they should not be disenfranchised due to an error that was not on the voter’s part,” Grizzell said.

Verlencia Myers, the nurse practitioner, said her husband’s ballot was rejected specifically because the envelope for his affidavit ballot was missing a signature. She guessed that it was missing a signature from a poll worker and not her husband’s.

Voters and voting advocates aren’t the only ones frustrated. County election officials told Democracy Docket they resent the new address-verification system and worry that the spike in inactive designations is eroding public trust in election officials.

Tonya Rivers, a Rankin County election commissioner, said the credit data — which she said came from Watson’s office — has led to increased affidavit ballot rejections this year because it contains “nowhere near correct information.” 

“We’ve spoken to some of the voters we’ve gotten suggested address changes for, and they’re like, ‘I’ve never been to that state. Don’t know anybody there. I don’t understand it.’ And they’re upset. And now they don’t trust us,” Rivers said.

She also took issue with insinuations that county officials are responsible for inactive voter issues this year.

“We have heard it is apparently our fault — that we’re not properly using the Experian data and that’s causing these problems,” Rivers said. “I will say I strongly disagree with that.”

Emily Gross contributed reporting.

*The Elias Law Group (ELG) represents the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and is active in the legal effort on behalf of the Colom campaign. ELG Firm Chair Marc Elias is the founder of Democracy Docket.