NORFOLK, Va. — Democratic lawmakers are now calling for a federal investigation into Virginia's voter rolls after some voters were mistakenly removed from them.
The lawmakers, including Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine and Rep. Bobby Scott, sent the letter to the Department of Justice asking them to probe whether any federal laws were violated.
"It needs to be investigated so that they know you can't just casually remove people from the rolls who are legally registered," Scott told News 3 in an interview.
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Report raises new questions over Virginia felon voting rights restoration
In Virginia if someone is convicted of a felony, they lose their civil rights, including the right to vote.
The only person who can restore the rights is the governor.
The Department of Elections recently published an annual report on the state's voter rolls and noted more than 10,000 people who had their rights restored following felony convictions have been removed again from the voter rolls.
It's since been reported just under 300 were mistakenly incorrectly removed for committing probation violations, which are not the same as new felony convictions.
"How many people were involved? You have a list of people who have parole violations, not new felonies. Didn't someone notice?" asked Scott.
Gov. Youngkin told News 3 last week State Police had mistakenly categorized the probation violations as felonies.
Watch previous coverage: Report raises new questions over Virginia felon voting rights restoration
He said his team was working to correct the situation.
"We will contact anyone who's been impacted by this immediately so that they know they've been restored to the voter rolls," he said. "We're going to make sure that they can register to vote and can vote."
The Virginia Department of Elections told News 3 they had nothing new to add when reached for out to comment Thursday.
The Department of Justice has not responded to questions about whether they will open an investigation.
"You can't just say, 'My bad. Don't worry about it.'" said Scott. "Yes, we're worried about people being removed from the voter rolls."
