US Justice Department gives California 48 hours to review voter list — TimesLIVE
The US Department of Justice has given California officials 48 hours to review a list of people whom the federal government considers likely noncitizens of the United States and who were sent mail-in ballots. If the requirements are not met, the department threatened to seek emergency court relief, TimesLIVE reports, citing Reuters.
The letter to California Secretary of State Shirley Weber was signed by acting Assistant Attorney General R. Trent McCotter. It states that Los Angeles County officials were provided with a password-protected USB drive containing the names of people whom federal authorities consider likely noncitizens of the United States.
Ballot requirements
The Justice Department requires that ballots not be sent to people on the list until their citizenship is confirmed. If such voters have already received ballots and return them, state authorities must separate those ballots from others. Ballots that have already been returned must not be counted until the citizenship of their owners is established, the letter says.
McCotter said allowing noncitizens to vote “nullifies the votes of citizens.” Justice Department spokesperson Kirsten Pells confirmed the existence of the letter and said the department would take all necessary legal measures to protect election integrity and ensure compliance with federal law. The White House and the office of California’s secretary of state did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
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Pressure on states ahead of elections
The letter was another step by Donald Trump’s administration, which is pressuring states over claims of noncitizen voting ahead of the November 3 elections. The Justice Department had previously sent similar warnings to election officials in all 50 states, stating that criminal prosecution was possible for knowingly leaving noncitizens on voter rolls or allowing them to vote.
The department also demanded nonpublic voter data from nearly all states, including Social Security numbers or dates of birth. It filed lawsuits against 30 states led by Democrats and Republicans that refused to provide the rolls, but lost 26 cases and did not secure a victory in any of them.
Reuters reported in September that, due to software failures and administrative errors, states may have added more than 30,000 noncitizens to voter rolls since 2000. At the same time, it is unknown how many of them voted, and experts consider these figures too small, compared with 170 million registered voters, to affect election results.
