Registrars have reported that as many as a third of the applications cannot be entered into the system, and many of the rest require more information. The state Republican Party called the operation “the Dems’ phony registration drive.”

Democrats say the burden is on the registrars to double-check and verify application information.

“Instead of throwing up complaints, they should be working to get as many people as possible registered,” said Matthew Miller, a spokesman for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee in Washington, which paid for the drive because Senator Mary Landrieu, a Democrat, is up for re-election and her voter base in New Orleans was eroded by Hurricane Katrina.

Michael Slater, the deputy director of Project Vote, said high numbers of incomplete applications were not unusual in such drives. He said as a rule of thumb, 35 percent of voter drive applications were new voters, 35 percent were change of address, and 30 percent were duplicates or incomplete.

In Louisiana, voting drive canvassers are required by law to submit the applications they collect, even if they are obvious pranks, like two cards in Shreveport that listed George Bush as the name of the applicant and 1600 Pennsylvania Drive as the address.

But Jacques Berry, a spokesman for the secretary of state, said canvassers should be “educated enough to not leave the house until the card is in order.”

John Maginnis, a political analyst in Baton Rouge, pointed out that the federal motor-voter law, which allows people to register when they get a driver’s license, had already raised registration to near-saturation levels. The key to winning the election, he said, will rest more on turnout than registration.

“You’re getting down to people that are just hard-core disengaged,” he said. “If you get these voters on the rolls, the question is how many of them are likely voters.”