Oregon's "motor voter" law is registering new voters at eight times the old rate, according to data released Thursday. This year's new law automatically registers Oregonians as voters when they obtain or renew a driver's license.
Oregon Secretary of State Jeanne Atkins says the state added more than 4,300 people to the voter rolls in the law's first week. She says previously, Oregon added about 2,000 a month.
Atkins told OPB's Think Out Loud there has been a side benefit to the motor voter law.
"We are finding that many of them are registered voters, and that they have now new addresses. So we have done more than 17,000 addresses updates through this process so far," Atkins said.
Atkins says the corrected addresses will help more voters get their election information.
The vast majority of the new voters are registering as "unaffiliated." Oregonians can "opt-out" of the voter registration, but very few have done that.