### Conservative Groups Gear Up for 2024 Election with Noncitizen Voting Claims

As the 2024 election approaches, conservative activists are utilizing Webex to discuss a contentious narrative: a purported left-wing scheme to allow noncitizens to vote. Hundreds of participants, many of them white, gather weekly to exchange questionable evidence supporting this premise. Jeff Vega, a conservative Latino activist from Michigan, claimed at an August meeting that there's a plot to "get the illegals to become voters." Among the meeting attendees are a Wisconsin state lawmaker, a former Trump administration official, and a U.S. congressman.

These meetings are organized by the Election Integrity Network, a conservative coalition focused on “securing the legality of every American vote,” in collaboration with numerous state-level partners. Reporters are barred from these sessions, but leaked recordings have reached media outlets like NBC News. These video conferences are standard fare for grassroots organizing, but the underlying cause has provoked a significant mobilization of self-proclaimed patriots determined to "save the election."

For the upcoming 2024 election, Republicans have homed in almost exclusively on the issue of noncitizen voting, distinguishing this approach from the broad-spectrum falsehoods of 2020. This narrative is particularly compelling because it’s challenging to disprove. Conservative groups have effectively used this claim to energize their base, introduce restrictive federal and state voting measures, and initiate lawsuits to cast doubt on the election's security.

Despite the discreditation of the noncitizen voting claim by various studies, it remains a potent topic. A 2016 study found only 30 incidents of suspected illegal noncitizen voting among 23.5 million votes, equating to 0.0001%. Still, more than 200 Republican members of Congress have discussed the issue on social media this year, stirring violence-inclined comments from supporters.

The broader objective for these groups is to build a foundation for questioning the 2024 election results. Michael Waldman, president of the Brennan Center for Justice, stated at a congressional hearing in May that this tactic is purposely being prepared in advance.

Cleta Mitchell, a key figure in the movement, transitioned to the right in the 1990s and has been actively involved in voter fraud litigation. Her role as a legal advisor to Trump during his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia garnered her national attention. In 2021, she founded the Election Integrity Network under the Conservative Partnership Institute, rallying an army of election workers and activists.

Mitchell’s initiatives have included the Only Citizens Vote Coalition, aimed at preventing noncitizens from registering to vote. This coalition, in partnership with 80 other organizations, has drafted model legislation to ban noncitizen voting, influencing groups like the American Legislative Exchange Council. Although recent federal legislation related to this issue, the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act (SAVE Act), failed to pass, the advocacy efforts continue undeterred.

Key conservative entities such as Americans for Citizen Voting, the Heritage Foundation's Oversight Project, and the Election Transparency Initiative are joined in their aim to challenge voter rolls and promote legislation to restrict voting access. This coordinated focus on noncitizen voting marks a strategic shift from the disjointed misinformation campaigns of the 2020 election cycle.