Justice Department Gives California 48 Hours to Review Voters It Calls Noncitizens

Updated 21:08 UTC

The Justice Department sued California on Thursday, asking a federal judge to block the state from counting mail ballots in the November 3 midterm elections from more than 20,000 voters the department says are likely noncitizens, until their citizenship is verified.

Reuters reported the lawsuit was filed in the US District Court for the Central District of California, which covers Los Angeles, after the noon Thursday deadline in the department letters passed. The filing asks the court to order officials to set aside ballots from people on the federal list and not tabulate them until citizenship has been determined, and to withhold ballots not yet sent until status is confirmed.

Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a statement announcing the suit that state facilitated voter fraud is unacceptable. Governor Gavin Newsom's office called the lawsuit unfounded on Thursday. California Attorney General Rob Bonta had criticised the original demand on Wednesday, and Senator Adam Schiff called the lawsuit a dangerous attempt to destabilise elections. Reuters reported that neither Secretary of State Shirley Weber's office nor Los Angeles County Registrar Dean Logan's office immediately responded to requests for comment on the suit.

The Justice Department has given California 48 hours to review a list of voters the department says are likely noncitizens, or face legal action less than three weeks before the November 3 midterm elections.

The demand came in letters sent on Tuesday by R. Trent McCotter, the acting deputy attorney general. One went to California Secretary of State Shirley Weber. The other went to Dean Logan, the registrar-recorder for Los Angeles County. Reuters reviewed the letters and reported them first. The Associated Press and CNN obtained them as well.

A thumb drive and a deadline

The department gave Los Angeles County officials a password protected thumb drive holding the names of people the federal government believes are likely noncitizens and were sent mail ballots in California. The letters give the state and the county 48 hours to check the list for any citizens included by mistake.

For anyone whose citizenship cannot be verified in that time, the state is told to instruct local officials to segregate returned mail ballots and not count them until citizenship is determined. Ballots that have not been sent yet are to be withheld from people on the list until their status is confirmed.

"If you cannot implement this process by then, given the ongoing federal election, the United States will have no choice but to seek emergency relief," the letter to Weber says.

McCotter wrote that allowing noncitizens to vote cancels citizen votes. Justice Department spokeswoman Kiersten Pels confirmed the letters to Reuters. She said the department will take all necessary legal action to protect election integrity and to ensure compliance with federal law.

California reviews the demand

Logan said on Wednesday that his office is reviewing the letter with the secretary of state and the state attorney general. Neither Weber nor Governor Gavin Newsom had commented publicly by Wednesday, according to USA Today.

California Senator Adam Schiff condemned the demand in a social media post. He called it a dangerous attempt to destabilize safe and secure elections and said California would defend against what he called federal meddling in state run elections.

The wider fight over voter rolls

The letters are the sharpest step yet in the Trump administration's push to press states over alleged noncitizen voting, an issue the president has raised for years. Voting by noncitizens is already illegal in federal elections, and cases are rare. The Associated Press reported that the Justice Department has charged about 90 people with election misconduct so far this year, including about 50 accused of voting as noncitizens. About 227 million people were registered to vote in the 2024 presidential election.

CNN reported that courts have repeatedly pushed back on earlier administration efforts to insert federal officials into the running of state elections. Ballots have already been mailed in some states, which raises the stakes of a fight over who gets counted on November 3, when control of the House and the Senate is decided and Republicans defend narrow majorities in Congress.