The U.S. Department of Justice will monitor polling sites in five California counties as voters decide on Proposition 50 on Nov. 4, it said Friday, after being asked to do so by state GOP officials.<\/p>\n
Monitoring, which is routinely conducted by the Justice Department, will occur across Southern California and in the Central Valley, in Fresno, Kern, Los Angeles, Orange and Riverside counties, the Justice Department said.<\/p>\n
Prop. 50 \u2014 one of November\u2019s most hotly-watched electoral issues, with national political implications \u2014 asks California voters whether the state should redraw its congressional districts to better favor Democrats. It is a response to President Trump\u2019s pressure campaign on Texas and other red states to redraw their lines in favor of Republicans, and is considered a must-pass measure if Democrats hope to regain control of the House in next year\u2019s midterms.<\/p>\n
The Justice Department said its monitors would work to \u201censure transparency, ballot security, and compliance with federal law,\u201d including the Voting Rights Act, National Voter Registration Act, Help America Vote Act, Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, and the Civil Rights Acts.<\/p>\n
\u201cTransparency at the polls translates into faith in the electoral process, and this Department of Justice is committed to upholding the highest standards of election integrity,\u201d said Atty Gen. Pam Bondi. \u201cWe will commit the resources necessary to ensure the American people get the fair, free, and transparent elections they deserve.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOur democracy depends on free and fair elections,\u201d said acting U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli, the top federal prosecutor in the L.A. region, who will be helping to coordinate the monitoring effort. \u201cWe will work tirelessly to uphold and protect the integrity of the election process.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Justice Department also announced monitors will be stationed in Passaic County, N.J. That state is holding a consequential gubernatorial election.<\/p>\n
While federal monitoring is routine, it has been viewed with heightened skepticism from both parties in recent years. When the Justice Department under President Joe Biden announced monitoring in 86 jurisdictions across 27 states during last November\u2019s presidential election, some Republican-led states balked and sought to block the effort.<\/p>\n
Democrats have been highly skeptical of the Trump administration\u2019s plans for monitoring elections, in part because of Trump\u2019s relentless denial of past election losses \u2014 including his own to Biden in 2020 \u2014 and his appointment of fellow election deniers to high-ranking positions in his administration, including in the Justice Department.<\/p>\n
Corrin Rankin, chair of the California Republican Party, had specifically asked the Justice Department to send monitors to the five counties in a letter to the Justice Department on Monday.<\/p>\n
Rankin wrote that the party had \u201creceived reports of irregularities\u201d in each of the counties during recent elections, which they feared could \u201cundermine either the willingness of voters to participate in the election or their confidence in the announced results of the election\u201d this November.<\/p>\n
Rankin called Prop 50 a \u201cpolitically charged question,\u201d and said it was \u201cimperative to have robust voter participation and public confidence in the results regardless of the outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n
Matt Shupe, a spokesperson for the California GOP, declined to comment on the letter Friday.<\/p>\n
California officials, including Secretary of State Shirley Weber and California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta have promised safe and fair elections and said their teams will also be out in the field enforcing California\u2019s election laws in November.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur election laws provide the backbone for a free and fair election, and as California\u2019s top law enforcement officer, I will do everything in my power to protect your right to vote,\u201d Bonta recently said. \u201cIn the lead up to the election and on Election Day, my office will be on call to provide assistance to the Secretary of State\u2019s Office in enforcing California\u2019s election laws, as needed, through a team of attorneys and administrative staff located across the state.\u201d<\/p>\n
Dean Logan, elections chief for Los Angeles County, said in a statement Friday that federal election monitors are welcome to view election activities and that the state has \u201cclear laws and guidelines that support observation and prohibit election interference.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe presence of election observers is not unusual and is a standard practice across the country,\u201d said Dean.<\/p>\n
Dean didn\u2019t directly address the California GOP\u2019s specific statements about Los Angeles County, but said that the county regularly updates and verifies voter records in coordination with state and federal agencies and protects the integrity of the election process.<\/p>\n
\u201cVoters can have confidence their ballot is handled securely and counted accurately,\u201d<\/p>\n
This article will be updated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The U.S. Department of Justice will monitor polling sites in five California counties as voters decide on Proposition…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21602,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,17490,17492,9,8,17491,1751,204,17495,17496,4515,17494,17493,11053,3020,1920,225,1522],"class_list":["post-21601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-atty","tag-california-county","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-corinn-rankin","tag-democrats","tag-election","tag-election-law","tag-fair-election","tag-justice-department","tag-monitor","tag-monitoring","tag-november","tag-president-trump","tag-prop","tag-state","tag-voter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21601\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}