State officials are touting Automatic Voter Registration in Minnesota which has already seen more than 15,000 eligible Minnesotans register to vote.
For years, Minnesota has had a so-called 'motor-voter law' where someone getting or renewing a driver's license at a Driver and Vehicle Services office would check a box "opting in" to voter registration.
Minnesota state lawmakers passed an Automatic Voter Registration law last year and the process got underway in April.
Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon called Automatic Voter Registration an "opt-out" process instead of an "opt-in" process during a Tuesday morning press conference.
"Eligible Minnesotans will be registered to vote, or their current voter registration will be updated without having to proactively check a box when applying for or renewing a driver's license or state ID," Simon says. "If they are eligible, they will be registered to vote."
DVS employees begin the verification process by reviewing documents provided by the applicants and previous transactions to determine if the applicant is a U.S. Citizen.
Once that is cleared, the information is sent to the Office of the Minnesota Secretary of State. State elections officials then review and verify that the applicant has the right to vote.
"Automatic Voter Registration requires multiple layers of actual human reviews and verifications by state and local elections officials to ensure each application is eligible, they are who they say they are, and they live where they say they live," added Simon.
Applicants will be sent an opt-out notice to their residence. If an individual returns the notice within 20 days, they will not be registered to vote.
"We'll have far fewer people needing to register on Voting Day," Simon explained. "It could result in a decrease of 80 to 90 percent in the number of people who need to register same-day. They will have already been in the system weeks, even months, beforehand."
Since there is a 20-day opt-out period and a verification process, voter registration may take four to six weeks from when a person first applies for their state-issued ID. Minnesotans can check their voter registration status online.