US justice department sues California over alleged noncitizen voting

Key points

• The US justice department sued California on Thursday to stop it tabulating certain midterm election ballots.
• The department sent Los Angeles county a thumb drive with over 20,000 names of likely noncitizens and gave 48 hours to act.
• California officials refused to review the list, and a scholar called the effort a publicity stunt.

The US Department of Justice sued California on Thursday, seeking a court order to prevent the state from counting certain ballots cast in the midterm elections. The lawsuit was filed in federal court in the central district of California.

The suit followed a demand made two days earlier. On Tuesday, the department sent election officials in Los Angeles county a thumb drive with a handwritten password that it said contained the names of noncitizens registered to vote. Officials were asked to confirm the citizenship of anyone on the list and set aside ballots from those whose status could not be confirmed. The department gave the state 48 hours to act and did not explain how it compiled the names.

California officials refuse to comply

The Los Angeles county clerk and recorder, Dean Logan, said his office would not review the list, in part because it did not consider the USB drive secure. In its lawsuit, the justice department said it had provided more than 20,000 names of likely noncitizens.

California secretary of state Shirley Weber, a Democrat, said the justice department had not given the list to her office. She said the department's efforts to gain access to protected voter data and purge voter rolls serve only to cause chaos and fuel public distrust in elections.

The [justice department’s] relentless efforts to unlawfully gain access to states’ protected voter data and purge voter rolls serve only to cause chaos and fuel public distrust in our elections

— Shirley Weber

Court request and expert criticism

Justice department lawyers asked the court to order California not to count votes from the flagged people until their citizenship is determined. The lawsuit said the court should enjoin California from tabulating vote-by-mail ballots from likely noncitizens in the upcoming federal election.

Election law scholar Richard Hasen called the effort a nice publicity stunt that reinforces the notion among the president's most ardent supporters that California is not doing enough to combat voter fraud. He said the justice department has no standing to tell states and localities to remove voters during an election, and that the National Voter Registration Act bars systematic purges in the 90 days before an election.