The US Justice Department has opened a criminal investigation in California, issuing federal grand jury subpoenas to election officials over alleged noncitizen voting days before the Nov 3 midterms. The California noncitizen voting probe has drawn sharp reactions from local officials, who say they are following state and federal law.
A US official confirmed to NBC News that the Justice Department has issued federal grand jury subpoenas to local election officials across California. NBC News could not say how many subpoenas were sent or exactly who received them.
The Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder’s office received federal grand jury subpoenas seeking information on its methods for detecting "unlawful voting by aliens" and preventing such ballots from being counted, according to the Straits Times, which reprinted a Reuters report. Reuters reported it was not immediately clear whether the LA County office is the focus of the investigation, and that point remains unconfirmed.
LA County Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan said in a statement that the Justice Department has taken a "confrontational, adversarial approach" and that election officials are acting in accordance with state and federal law.
Justice Department letters sent last week to 57 of California’s 58 counties warned officials to cooperate with federal voting investigations or face investigations themselves, according to NBC News.
The administration’s effort has also involved court fights. On Oct 28, a federal judge rejected a Justice Department request to temporarily block California from counting mail-in ballots from a list of 20,000 voters the administration alleges are likely noncitizens, according to the Straits Times. The 20,000-voter figure comes from the administration’s allegations, and no independent verification is reported.
On Oct 29, Acting Deputy Attorney-General Trent McCotter told reporters that the Justice Department has charged 156 immigrants with voting or registering to vote unlawfully in a pre-midterm push, according to the Straits Times.
California’s lawyers have questioned the reliability of the Trump administration’s immigration data and argued the federal government lacks authority to intervene in its elections. Studies have repeatedly shown noncitizen voting is rare and has no impact on election results, according to Reuters. NBC News says newly naturalized citizens are often mistakenly flagged as noncitizens.
NBC News also reports that the administration has sued 30 states and the District of Columbia over refusal to hand over voter registration list data.
The Justice Department declined to comment on the subpoenas and on reported leaks, so no official account of the investigation’s target or scope is available. The New York Times first reported the subpoenas, but that original report was not among the sources available for this article. Only two full articles were available, from Reuters and NBC News, and an appeals court denial is covered by NBC News alone.
The probe’s scope and targets remain unclear. Further legal fights over California’s mail ballots and voter citizenship checks are likely before the Nov 3 midterms.
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This article was written with AI assistance from the published reporting listed above. It is part of the World Brief daily news podcast.