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95,000 non-citizens are registered to vote in Texas, state officials discover

Of the 95,000 non-citizens registered, 58,000 have voted in one or more elections since 1996.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The information released by state officials was later found to be inaccurate. Within days of this original story, state officials had walked back the numbers, saying that a "substantial number" of the voters were citizens. 

About 95,000 non-citizens are registered to vote in Texas, and more than half of those have cast ballots in at least one election, Texas Secretary of State David Whitley announced on Friday.

Whitley's office, along with the Texas Department of Public Safety, had been investigating possible voter fraud for the last year, according to a news release. 

Of the 95,000 non-citizens registered, 58,000 have voted in one or more elections since 1996.

RELATED: Civil rights groups threaten litigation after state says 95,000 voters are non-U.S. citizens

The Secretary of State's office found those numbers by collecting current DPS data of people who have applied for a driver's license or state identification card in the last five years with a green card or visa. The investigators then cross-referenced that data with people who are registered to vote.

The Secretary of State's office sent the information to the state attorney general's office, which will decide whether to pursue voter fraud charges. The attorney general's office has prosecuted 130 cases of voter fraud since 2005.

In August, WFAA reported that hundreds of non-citizens had been discovered as registered voters and that the secretary of state's office was working to improve its voter database to determine the exact number of non-citizens registered.

RELATED: Texas quietly informs counties some of 95,000 voters flagged for citizenship review don't belong on list

RELATED: Texas mistakenly asked counties to remove U.S. citizens from voter rolls

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