Is voter fraud a problem in the US?

Voter fraud is not a significant problem in the US in terms of actual, documented occurrence—virtually all rigorous academic and nonpartisan research finds it to be extremely rare—though there's a notable gap between this empirical reality and public perception, which remains a politically contentious issue.

What the research shows

Multiple studies across the political spectrum consistently find fraud rates in the range of thousandths or millionths of a percent:

State-level analyses: In Pennsylvania, Heritage Foundation data covering 30 years and 32 elections identified just 39 cases of voter fraud—0.000039 percent of the more than 100 million ballots cast. Similarly, in Arizona, there were around 42.6 million votes cast with only 36 cases of fraud in total.

National studies: The Brennan Center's landmark report found that most reported incidents of voter fraud are actually traceable to other sources, such as clerical errors or bad data matching practices, with incident rates between 0.0003 percent and 0.0025 percent—concluding it's more likely an American will be struck by lightning than impersonate another voter at the polls. Another comprehensive review identified 31 credible instances of impersonation fraud from 2000 to 2014, out of more than 1 billion ballots cast over that period.

Mail-in voting specifically: Researchers at the Brookings Institution examined cases of fraud reported during elections in 2016, 2018, 2020, and 2022 and estimated there were about four cases of fraud for every 10 million mail ballots cast, on average.

Noncitizen voting: Studies indicate noncitizens vote in U.S. elections at a rate of 0.0001%, less than the odds of being struck by lightning in a lifetime.

DOJ enforcement data: Between 2000-2020, the U.S. Department of Justice investigated 455 voter fraud cases, resulting in 171 convictions—a small number relative to the hundreds of millions of votes cast over those two decades.

Why fraud rates are so low

Any widespread voter fraud is unlikely due to the decentralized nature of American elections. Experts also point to deterrence: it's a criminal offense to commit ballot fraud, and most people don't want to go to jail, which is a sufficient deterrent for almost everybody, according to Darrell West of the Brookings Institution—it's probably a very small number of people who even attempt it.

The perception gap

Despite this evidence, public belief in widespread fraud remains high and sharply partisan. A Pew Research Center survey found that 54% of Republicans believe voter fraud is a major problem in U.S. elections, compared to 6% of Democrats. A 2024 academic survey similarly found that substantial proportions of U.S. registered voters believe that various types of election fraud are common, even though research conducted during the past two decades has concluded that there is no evidence of significant election fraud in contemporary American national elections.

Bottom line

The empirical research consensus—spanning nonpartisan academics, the Brennan Center, Brookings, and even analyses using the conservative Heritage Foundation's own fraud database—is that documented voter fraud occurs at vanishingly small rates and has never been shown to be widespread enough to affect election outcomes. That said, election security remains a legitimate policy concern debated by lawmakers, and the perception of fraud (whether justified or not) has significant political consequences, as seen in disputes over the 2020 and subsequent elections.