DES MOINES, Iowa — Hundreds of 17-year-olds who could not cast ballots in the 2020 election because of their age are among 294,000 registered Iowa voters recently marked as inactive.
Being marked as inactive in the state's voter registration database does not immediately affect anyone’s ability to vote in any way, according to the Iowa Secretary of State’s office.
But under state law, it’s the first step in a process that would result in the cancellation of one’s registration after four more years of inactivity.
A new law rewriting election rules, signed by Gov. Kim Reynolds last month, requires the Iowa Secretary of State to move all voters who did not cast ballots in the most recent general election to inactive status.
Previously, they had to miss two.