A federal judge rejected the Trump administration’s emergency bid to set aside California ballots cast by more than 20,000 voters the Justice Department suspects are noncitizens, six days before the November 3 midterm elections. United States District Judge David O. Carter denied the request for a temporary restraining order on October 28, finding that the government’s claims lacked credible support and that its plan risked disenfranchising eligible voters. California can continue processing mail ballots under its existing procedures.
Carter said in a 26-page ruling on the California ballots case that the request would disrupt an election already under way. More than 3.7 million Californians had already voted, and over 500,000 ballots had been processed when he considered the case. Separating the disputed ballots would have required election officials to develop new procedures in the middle of counting. “This request violates longstanding constitutional principles mandating that states have control over their elections,” Carter wrote.
The judge also warned that granting the California ballots request would invite future abuse. “If Plaintiff’s last minute request for relief were granted, either party could create chaos for their own political purposes to disrupt the election process,” he wrote, adding that over 20,000 registered Californians could lose a right that generations of Americans fought to preserve. In a passage quoted widely after the ruling, Carter wrote that never before had the federal government, on the eve of an election, sought to coerce a state to abandon its own constitutional election procedures.
How the California ballots case reached court
The California ballots case began when the Justice Department sued California and Los Angeles County on October 15, claiming federal investigators had identified more than 20,000 registered voters who were likely noncitizens. The department sent state officials a list of those names on October 13 and demanded that they verify each person’s citizenship within 48 hours or separate their ballots until eligibility could be established. The list was built by comparing voter registration records with federal immigration databases and information from third parties.
California questioned the accuracy of the California ballots list and asked for details about the method behind the list. State attorneys argued that the data was outdated and unreliable, and they pointed to a similar case in Nevada, where an initial estimate of noncitizen voters fell sharply after review and the people in question turned out to be citizens. Carter concluded that the department was unlikely to succeed on several fronts, including standing, and that its emergency was of its own making after months of delay.
California ballots ruling follows appeals court refusal
At a hearing on the California ballots dispute in Los Angeles on October 27, state attorney Samuel Siegal argued that the department was asking the court to short-circuit the democratic process while voting was under way. The Justice Department appealed Carter’s ruling at once, sending the dispute back to the Ninth Circuit, which had already cast doubt on the administration’s case. The department had argued that it was seeking only to set ballots aside, rather than discard them, until citizenship could be confirmed. The California ballots dispute now returns to the Ninth Circuit for a fresh appeal.
Trump takes midterm campaign to Ohio
The California ballots ruling came as President Donald Trump campaigned in Ohio on October 28, holding a midterm rally at the Shoemaker Center on the Ohio University Chillicothe campus. It was his third Ohio rally in October, in a stretch of near-daily rallies aimed at holding the Senate for Republicans. Doors opened at 3:30 p.m., with the president expected to speak around 7 p.m., and admission was free through the Republican National Committee’s events page.