Register to Vote: These instructions match the spaces on the Pennsylvania Voter Registration application. Use a black ink pen on your form and print clearly. If you have a PA Driver’s License or PennDOT ID, you can easily apply online at www.pa.gov. If you register with the last four digits of your Social Security number, you can register online but you must upload your signature.
1. Name - Print last name first. If you are having an official name change during a courthouse naturalization ceremony, you must use your new name.
2. Eligibility - You cannot complete this section until after you are sworn in as a citizen. Then check “yes” to both questions if you will be at least 18 years old on Election Day.
3. Reason - All newly naturalized citizens check “New registration.” You may also check “Mail-in voting.”
4. About you – “Birth date” is required to prove you are 18 by the next election. Phone and email are not required, but email is especially helpful if an item is missing or illegible, and it enables the county to email progress reports.
5. Your Address - This cannot be a post office box. All sections, except municipality, are required. County is important.
6. Mailing address for voter registration – You may check “Same as above” unless you have a post office (P.O.) box.
7. Identification - Only one of these three is required: PA Driver's License or PennDOT number or the last four digits of your Social Security number.
8. Political Party – Joining a political party is not required. However, to vote in Pennsylvania’s spring Closed Primary elections, you must have registered in one of the major political parties (Democratic or Republican). Any voter can vote for any candidate in any party in the November General Elections. All voters can vote for constitutional amendments, ballot questions, and in special elections. The "Independent" party is not an official party in PA. The minor parties --Green and Libertarian-- and other political bodies-- Keystone, Forward, Constitutional, and American Solidarity, are permitted to have candidates on General Election ballots. If you don't wish to join a party, you may check “none” and then go online in the future at www.pa.gov to select or change your party.
9. Name or Address Change – Leave this blank because you are registering for the first time.
10. Voting Assistance – You only complete this if you need help at the polls due to disability or language.
11. Be a Poll Worker – Check if you’d like to be a poll worker or a bilingual interpreter.
12. Request a Mail-in Ballot – Check one of the two boxes: if you want a mail-in ballot only for the next election; or if you want a mail-in ballot for the next election and an application for a mail-in ballot each year. The application will arrive about February 1 of each year. You must complete it, sign it, and return it to get mail-in ballots for that year.
13. Mailing Address for Mail-in Ballot – Check one of the three boxes.
14. Declaration and Signature- Required. Individuals becoming naturalized complete this after they are sworn in. Then you sign your name, print your name, and list today’s date. If you write an “X” in lieu of a signature, someone else must complete the “Help with this form” section.
15. Help with this form – A family member, friend, or other person would complete this only if they helped you read or write on this form or if you used a mark (“X”) instead of a signature in the Declaration.
Mail pages 3, 4, and 5 to your county’s election office. Find address and phone numbers on Page 2. Keep pages 1-2.
For more information go to www.lwvpgh.org/register .
Revised February 2025