Biscuit Rigsby received an official restoration of rights certificate from the state of Virginia. Biscuit is a dog. Biscuit has also been dead for five years.
But sure, we're the crazy ones for wanting voter ID.
Governor Abigail Spanberger's office recently restored voting rights to tens of thousands of Virginians with felony convictions. Somewhere in that pile of paperwork, Biscuit Rigsby — a deceased canine — made the cut. The dog's owner discovered the certificate and, as one does in 2026, posted the evidence online. Matt Buckley flagged the absurdity: "Virginia recently restored voting rights to tens of thousands of people with felony convictions, including Biscuit Rigsby, a dog who died five years ago."
Now, a reasonable person might ask how a dog — a dead one, no less — ended up in a database of felons eligible for rights restoration. That question assumes the system was designed to catch errors like this. It wasn't. Virginia's process bulk-restores rights with minimal verification. Names go in, certificates come out. Nobody checks whether the recipient is alive, human, or both.
Republican Delegate Nick Freitas responded by demanding a full audit of Virginia's voter rolls. Not an unreasonable request when the state just enfranchised a corpse with four legs. Freitas has been pushing election integrity measures in the Virginia legislature for years, and Spanberger's office just handed him the most effective visual aid in political history.
If the system can't distinguish a dead dog from a living human felon, what else is it missing? The certificate wasn't generated by a rogue staffer with a sense of humor. It was generated by the same automated process that restored rights to every other name on the list. Biscuit didn't get special treatment. Biscuit got the standard treatment. That's the problem.
Virginia doesn't require voter ID for most elections. The state's voter registration system relies on self-reported information with limited cross-referencing. Spanberger, who took office promising to expand voting access, has resisted calls for stricter verification at every turn. Her position has always been that the system works and additional safeguards are unnecessary barriers.
A dead dog got a restoration of rights certificate. The system works.