A federal appeals court has turned away the Trump administration’s request to force California to segregate mail-in ballots from a list of 20,000 individuals flagged by federal officials as likely non-citizens registered to vote. The panel ruled that a lower-court judge must be allowed to hear the dispute first.
In a 2-1 decision issued on Monday following a rare Sunday hearing, a San Francisco appeals panel rejected the government’s argument that the court should immediately intervene because a district judge in Los Angeles had not issued a ruling quickly enough ahead of the midterm election.
According to the majority opinion, the United States failed to allow the district court adequate opportunity to consider its application for a temporary restraining order, meaning the appeals court lacked jurisdiction over the appeal.
The dismissal was approved by two judges, Mark Bennett, a Trump appointee, and Gabriel P. Sanchez, an appointee of former President Joe Biden. In a dissenting opinion, another Trump appointee, Patrick Bumatay, argued that California frustrated federal law by comingling the ballots of citizens and suspected non-citizens.
The Department of Justice sued California on October 15, alleging the state failed to join federal efforts to verify the citizenship status of individuals on the compiled list. The Trump administration has placed similar pressure on other states, but California was the first to face a lawsuit. The administration sought a temporary block on counting the contested ballots until citizenship statuses could be verified.
California officials argued that segregating the ballots would effectively disenfranchise legal voters because the election would conclude before their citizenship could be confirmed. Los Angeles County noted in an appellate filing that a sample of the 20,000 suspected non-citizens revealed that one in four were born in the United States, and that federal officials provided no information on how the list was compiled. In another instance, Nevada officials reported that a similar federal list yielded zero non-citizens.
Federal agents recently arrested 11 non-citizens across California who were charged with crimes including fraudulently registering to vote, alongside more than a dozen others charged in connection with the sweep. Meanwhile, national Democrats filed a separate suit in Washington federal court to block the administration’s plan, claiming the federal lists rely on shoddy data.
The case is expected to return to US District Judge David O. Carter, who scheduled a potential hearing for Tuesday. An eventual ruling by the lower court could prompt another round of appeals, potentially leading to the Supreme Court.
