By Lily Guiney
Gongwer News Service
More than 200 residents of Ypsilanti Township may have been wrongfully removed from voter rolls, the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan said Wednesday, a potential violation of state and federal laws.
In a letter sent to Ypsilanti Township Clerk Debbie Swanson on Tuesday, the organization said it was tipped off to individual instances of voters whose registrations were canceled after absentee ballots and “cancellation cards” were returned to the clerk’s office as undeliverable. One voter, whose mail was not delivered for a period of time due to issues at the post office, found her voter registration had been terminated when she started receiving mail again.
When that voter contacted the clerk’s office to ask why her registration had been canceled, Swanson’s staff responded that it was because of the undeliverable mail and gave no other indication that another factor contributed to canceling the registration, which ACLU attorneys said is “flagrantly unlawful.”
“We are in receipt of information, including communications made by your own office, that Ypsilanti voters were purged when mail sent to their home was returned to your office as undeliverable,”
ACLU attorneys said in the letter. “Instead, such voters (at most) should have been placed in challenged status for two federal election cycles as required by the National Voter Registration Act and Michigan’s Election Law. If true, such actions likely also violate the Michigan Constitution’s guarantee of a fundamental right to vote.”
The attorneys went on to say in the letter that the ACLU reviewed publicly available voter registration data and internal communications from Swanson’s office which it says reveal a larger and more alarming trend.
“This would be concerning enough if this was an isolated incident that concerned only one voter,” the letter said. “However, the email we have reviewed from your office appears to describe a policy of canceling voters immediately after a notice sent to the voter from your office has been returned as undeliverable.”
Swanson told The Ann Arbor News/MLive that her office was looking into the concerns and looks forward to working with the ACLU on the issue.
The ACLU reviewed data from Michigan’s Qualified Voter File, specifically related to absentee ballot rejections for the August and November 2025 election. The QVF showed Ypsilanti Township had an “exceptionally high rate” of rejections for “Voter Status Marked Canceled” reasons.
“In the August 2025 primary election, 400 absentee ballots statewide were rejected for this reason. 125 of those – i.e., over 30% – were from Ypsilanti Township. In the November 2025 general election, 958 absentee ballots were rejected statewide for this reason, and 86 of them – nearly 10% of the statewide total – were from Ypsilanti Township,” the attorneys said. “According to Michigan’s 2024 Biennial Precinct Report, less than 1% of the active voters registered in the state are in Ypsilanti Township. This data suggests that hundreds of voters may have had their registration wrongfully cancelled due to your office’s policies.”
The letter sent to the clerk’s office included a Freedom of Information Act Request to the clerk for a list of voters whose registrations were canceled between Jan. 1, 2025 and now and reasons for cancellation; a list voters who have been reinstated; an indication of whether voters are currently in challenged status in the NVRA waiting period; and a list of every voter who received a notice from the office, along with an indication of the results of the calls.
Also requested was a review of all the voter removals that have been made by the township clerk since she took office at the beginning of 2024, reinstatement of any erroneously removed voters and for notifications to be sent to voters who are reinstated informing them of the reinstatement.
“Our goal is not to place onerous or unnecessary demands on the time of you and your staff, but, rather, to protect the fundamental right to vote of every eligible voter in Michigan, correct any unlawful voter cancellations that occurred, and thoroughly understand what has occurred so that we can help ensure that it does not happen again either in Ypsilanti Township or other jurisdictions,” the letter said. “We would of course prefer to resolve this without the need to enlist judicial guidance.”
Gongwer News Service
More than 200 residents of Ypsilanti Township may have been wrongfully removed from voter rolls, the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan said Wednesday, a potential violation of state and federal laws.
In a letter sent to Ypsilanti Township Clerk Debbie Swanson on Tuesday, the organization said it was tipped off to individual instances of voters whose registrations were canceled after absentee ballots and “cancellation cards” were returned to the clerk’s office as undeliverable. One voter, whose mail was not delivered for a period of time due to issues at the post office, found her voter registration had been terminated when she started receiving mail again.
When that voter contacted the clerk’s office to ask why her registration had been canceled, Swanson’s staff responded that it was because of the undeliverable mail and gave no other indication that another factor contributed to canceling the registration, which ACLU attorneys said is “flagrantly unlawful.”
“We are in receipt of information, including communications made by your own office, that Ypsilanti voters were purged when mail sent to their home was returned to your office as undeliverable,”
ACLU attorneys said in the letter. “Instead, such voters (at most) should have been placed in challenged status for two federal election cycles as required by the National Voter Registration Act and Michigan’s Election Law. If true, such actions likely also violate the Michigan Constitution’s guarantee of a fundamental right to vote.”
The attorneys went on to say in the letter that the ACLU reviewed publicly available voter registration data and internal communications from Swanson’s office which it says reveal a larger and more alarming trend.
“This would be concerning enough if this was an isolated incident that concerned only one voter,” the letter said. “However, the email we have reviewed from your office appears to describe a policy of canceling voters immediately after a notice sent to the voter from your office has been returned as undeliverable.”
Swanson told The Ann Arbor News/MLive that her office was looking into the concerns and looks forward to working with the ACLU on the issue.
The ACLU reviewed data from Michigan’s Qualified Voter File, specifically related to absentee ballot rejections for the August and November 2025 election. The QVF showed Ypsilanti Township had an “exceptionally high rate” of rejections for “Voter Status Marked Canceled” reasons.
“In the August 2025 primary election, 400 absentee ballots statewide were rejected for this reason. 125 of those – i.e., over 30% – were from Ypsilanti Township. In the November 2025 general election, 958 absentee ballots were rejected statewide for this reason, and 86 of them – nearly 10% of the statewide total – were from Ypsilanti Township,” the attorneys said. “According to Michigan’s 2024 Biennial Precinct Report, less than 1% of the active voters registered in the state are in Ypsilanti Township. This data suggests that hundreds of voters may have had their registration wrongfully cancelled due to your office’s policies.”
The letter sent to the clerk’s office included a Freedom of Information Act Request to the clerk for a list of voters whose registrations were canceled between Jan. 1, 2025 and now and reasons for cancellation; a list voters who have been reinstated; an indication of whether voters are currently in challenged status in the NVRA waiting period; and a list of every voter who received a notice from the office, along with an indication of the results of the calls.
Also requested was a review of all the voter removals that have been made by the township clerk since she took office at the beginning of 2024, reinstatement of any erroneously removed voters and for notifications to be sent to voters who are reinstated informing them of the reinstatement.
“Our goal is not to place onerous or unnecessary demands on the time of you and your staff, but, rather, to protect the fundamental right to vote of every eligible voter in Michigan, correct any unlawful voter cancellations that occurred, and thoroughly understand what has occurred so that we can help ensure that it does not happen again either in Ypsilanti Township or other jurisdictions,” the letter said. “We would of course prefer to resolve this without the need to enlist judicial guidance.”
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