A conservative group has filed a complaint with Washington’s top election official, saying it has found more than 16,000 cases of teenagers registering to vote before they were legally eligible.

In a small number of those cases, the Evergreen Freedom Foundation says the teens voted illegally before they turned 18. In the past eight years, the group’s search of voter data suggests that 108 young people wrongly voted on 127 ballots - four which were in this year’s presidential primary.

Under Washington law, 17-year-olds can register to vote if they’ll be 18 by the next election. But while most voters focus mainly on November, the “next election” could be sooner - it’s common for school levies, for example, to go to the ballot in springtime.

A spokesman for Secretary of State Sam Reed says a screening system enacted by county election officials in 2006 has dramatically reduced the problem, and state election workers found no evidence of underage voting last year.

The state did find 31 registrations of 17-year-olds who will not be 18 by the August primary, although all will be legal age by the general election on Nov. 4.

(Spokesman-Review)