Appeals court rejects DOJ bid to set aside disputed California ballots
The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the Justice Department's request for California to set aside disputed ballots received in the midterm election.
Key points
- The 9th Circuit ruled 2-1 against the Justice Department's bid to set aside disputed California ballots.
- The DOJ claims California sent ballots to about 20,000 people who may not be U.S. citizens.
- A federal judge ordered the disputed list of names shared with two civil rights groups.
A federal appeals court in Washington on Friday rejected the Justice Department's request that California set aside disputed ballots from the midterm election, according to CBS News. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit ruled 2-1, with Judges Mark Bennett and Gabriel Sanchez writing an unsigned decision and Judge Patrick Bumatay dissenting.
The administration has alleged that California sent ballots to some 20,000 people who may not be U.S. citizens and wants those ballots held back until citizenship can be verified. California officials say the list is highly unreliable and likely includes many U.S. citizens.
Court cites disenfranchisement risk
The majority said the Justice Department did not meet its burden for an injunction pending appeal. The judges wrote that granting the request might cause immense hardship and harm the public interest by risking the disenfranchisement of eligible voters and putting the tabulation process in jeopardy.
The panel said it found no clear error in the district court's conclusion that there is no feasible way to identify and separate the ballots of specific individuals without potentially catastrophic effects on the entire system. It called the requested relief "simple only in the abstract."
any election official who knowingly processes the ballot of a noncitizen is opening themselves to legal jeopardy
— Bill Essayli
Ballots already processed
The ruling came before Election Day on Tuesday, with millions of Californians already having voted and hundreds of thousands of ballots processed. Elections officials have said processed votes are completely anonymized and cannot be matched back to the voters who submitted them.
Earlier on Friday, a federal judge in Washington ordered the administration to share the disputed list of names with lawyers for the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights and the UCLA Voting Rights Project. It will be the first time a nongovernment organization can evaluate the merits of the roughly 20,000 names. The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
