The US Department of Justice has warned election officials across California that they could face federal scrutiny and legal consequences if they fail to help verify the citizenship status of suspected non-citizens on voter rolls and set aside their mail-in ballots pending checks.
In letters dated Friday, the department gave local officials 48 hours to help establish the citizenship status of individuals identified on federal government lists. The Justice Department shared copies of six letters with Reuters on Saturday.
Bilal Essayli, first assistant US attorney for the Central District of California, signed the letters.
Essayli warned that continuing to process ballots from individuals on the lists without verifying their citizenship status could expose officials to “significant federal scrutiny and legal exposure”.
Officials who knowingly counted ballots cast by individuals identified by federal agencies as non-citizens could become “aiders and abettors to a federal crime”, he wrote.
The letters included county-specific figures from a previously circulated list of 20,000 people whom the Justice Department alleges are non-citizens registered to vote.
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Essayli asked officials to separate, rather than cancel, the mail-in ballots of individuals whose citizenship status could not be confirmed until their status was established.
The Justice Department identified 1,754 suspected non-citizens registered to vote in Orange County, 1,355 in Riverside County, 1,133 in San Bernardino County, 334 in Ventura County, 180 in Santa Barbara County and 63 in San Luis Obispo County.
A separate letter sent to Contra Costa County listed 407 people described as “likely aliens” registered to vote.
“This letter came to us 11 days before Election Day with an unenforceable 48-hour deadline,” said Dawn Kruger, a spokesperson for Contra Costa County’s Elections Department.
“Our office is conducting this election in accordance with federal and state laws, and that is what we will continue to do,” she added.
The New York Times reported that versions of the letters were sent to all 58 counties in California.
The move comes less than two weeks before the US midterm elections, as the Justice Department intensifies prosecutions of people accused of illegally voting without US citizenship.
The White House has also urged federal agencies to accelerate their review of at least 47 state voter rolls obtained by the Department of Homeland Security, according to an internal email seen by Reuters.
On October 16, the Justice Department warned Los Angeles County and California election officials that they could face liability as accessories to a federal crime if they counted mail-in ballots returned by more than 20,000 people whom the Trump administration considers likely to be non-citizens.
California officials have rejected the administration’s actions, arguing that the federal government has not provided sufficient information to support its identification of the alleged non-citizens.
California Secretary of State Shirley Weber has accused the administration of seeking unlawful access to protected voter data and attempting to remove people from voter rolls, saying such efforts undermine public confidence in elections.
