DOJ charges 48 noncitizens with voting crimes ahead of midterms

The Justice Department announced on Monday morning that it has charged 48 non-U.S. citizens across California, Florida, Nevada, New York, and Pennsylvania with election-related federal crimes, the Washington Examiner reported. The charges include illegal voting in federal elections, fraudulent voter registration, and making false claims of U.S. citizenship to vote or register to vote. [1]

The arrests come after the Trump administration deployed federal law enforcement nationwide to detain noncitizens suspected of illegal voting, according to the Washington Examiner. The administration had claimed that cases of noncitizen voting had reached emergency levels in California, though MS NOW reported that the total number of federal prosecutions for noncitizen voting remains low across the country. [1][2][8]

The charges follow a federal request asking local election officials in California to sequester about 20,000 ballots sent to suspected noncitizen voters and provide sensitive details including Social Security numbers, PBS NewsHour reported. As FTMQ News reported earlier, California leaders rebuked the directive, and Los Angeles officials noted that a high percentage of voters on the list were native-born U.S. citizens. [3][9][16]

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals questioned the Justice Department during hearings on its emergency request to force California to set aside the 20,000 mail-in ballots, the Hill and Fox News reported. Appeals court judges expressed skepticism over the administration's bid to immediately segregate the ballots just days before the midterm elections. [4][5][6][10]