Federal prosecutors have issued letters to county registrars across California, directing local officials to set aside and verify ballots that the Department of Justice claims may belong to noncitizens. The directive represents an escalation in an ongoing legal battle between California officials and the federal government over voter registration lists ahead of the midterm elections.
According to the Los Angeles County registrar and copies of correspondence obtained by reporters, at least 18 counties throughout the state received the letters on Friday. The federal government has given local registrars a 48-hour deadline to supply identifying information tied to ballots believed to have been sent to individuals registered to vote improperly, while ordering them to sequester any votes where citizenship status cannot be definitively confirmed.
First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli warned that any election official who knowingly processes the ballot of a noncitizen faces potential legal jeopardy. The letters request detailed records for targeted voters, including Social Security numbers, identification data, and copies of voter registration forms.
For example, correspondence sent to voting officials in San Bernardino County noted that the federal government’s list of suspected noncitizen voters includes 1,133 individuals within that inland Southern California jurisdiction. Federal authorities state that acquiring this information will allow the government and state to quickly evaluate each person accused of unlawful registration.
The latest directives follow a federal lawsuit filed earlier in the month targeting Los Angeles County and the California Secretary of State’s office. That legal action seeks to prevent officials from counting the votes of approximately 20,000 individuals categorized by the federal government as likely noncitizen voters, with a court hearing scheduled for Tuesday. Additionally, the administration petitioned the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals for a ruling ahead of a district judge’s decision, imposing a Saturday deadline.
State officials have strongly pushed back against the federal demands. Lawyers representing California argued in court filings that the requests threaten to delay official vote certification, undermine public confidence in the legitimacy of the November midterms, and potentially disenfranchise eligible U.S. citizens due to what they describe as unreliable federal data.
Voting is currently underway across California, where mail-in ballots were sent out earlier this month to more than 23 million registered voters. State legal filings indicate that over 330,000 mail-in ballots have already been processed and counted.
The document demands arrived days after a statewide enforcement sweep by federal authorities resulted in criminal charges against 28 people from the list of 20,000. Those defendants face accusations of illegally registering to vote, alongside charges in certain cases of illegal voting and making false statements on naturalization paperwork, offenses that carry penalties of potential years in prison.
