NEW YORK—In a story May 9 about a proposal to allow some non-citizens to vote in New York City local elections, The Associated Press reported erroneously that Chicago allows immigrants to vote in school board elections. Members of the Chicago Board of Education are appointed, not elected.

A corrected version of the story is below:

NYC weighs allowing many immigrants to vote

NYC weighs allowing people who are in US legally, but not citizens, to vote in local elections


Associated Press




"We're all involved in politics since we're born. And the people who look for government to work for them have to be involved in the political process," Dominican immigrant Jose Torrero said through a translator in an interview.

Torrero, 70, left Santo Domingo to join his daughter in New York four years ago and has a green card. He's preparing to apply for citizenship, but it's likely years away. He was active in politics in his homeland, and he'd like to vote for New York candidates who share his views on immigration, job creation and other issues.

While immigrant and voting-rights advocates see non-citizen suffrage as a matter of taxpayer fairness and civic engagement, some officeholders and others view the vote as a fundamental province of citizenship, a privilege to hold out as a goal for new arrivals.

"Voting is the most important right we are granted as citizens, and you should have to go through the process of becoming a citizen and declaring allegiance to this country before being given that right," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said through a spokeswoman.


In a country that describes itself as a nation of immigrants, many states once let non-citizens vote. Those policies changed by the 1930s, amid anti-immigrant sentiment and other political currents of the time, said Ron Hayduk, a Queens College political science professor who wrote a book on immigrant voting.

The idea has had something of a renaissance in recent decades. A half-dozen Maryland cities now allow it, four Massachusetts towns have OK'd it but are awaiting state approval. But immigrant suffrage initiatives were defeated at the polls in San Francisco and Portland, Maine, in 2010.













Associated Press researcher Rhonda Shafner contributed to this report.


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