{"id":506219,"date":"2026-10-24T05:40:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-24T05:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/506219\/"},"modified":"2026-10-24T05:40:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-24T05:40:12","slug":"doj-orders-some-california-counties-to-verify-ballots-in-48-hours-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/506219\/","title":{"rendered":"DOJ orders some California counties to verify ballots in 48 hours"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Los Angeles (AP) \u2014 Federal prosecutors sent letters to county registrars across California on Friday demanding that local officials set aside and verify ballots that the Department of Justice said <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/california-election-justice-department-60e3dd468f43e0e8a32e6bf69341f189\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">may belong to noncitizens<\/a>, according to the Los Angeles County registrar and a letter obtained by The Associated Press.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The letters are the latest escalation in a <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/doj-california-elections-e08ec04efdb1110c0e3f815f2ce6a3db\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">legal battle<\/a> between California and President Donald Trump\u2019s Department of Justice, which has recently focused on the state in its efforts to <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/homeland-security-justice-department-midterms-noncitizen-voting-09b8391612fc87676267a254c55eaee8\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">root out noncitizen voting<\/a> ahead of the midterm elections. Data shows illegal voting by people who aren\u2019t U.S. citizens is <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/noncitizens-voting-republicans-election-2024-immigration-09b86e6768f755fd875f3c51b0e8ea70\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">incredibly rare<\/a>, difficult to prove and has not been shown to change the outcome of races.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Earlier this month, the federal government targeted <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/california-justice-department-voting-noncitizens-lawsuit-12c62cf12a7db6480c60975b6dea49b8\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Los Angeles County and the California Secretary of State\u2019s office<\/a> in a lawsuit that aimed to block them from counting the votes of roughly 20,000 people who are \u201clikely\u201d noncitizen voters. A hearing on the case is scheduled for Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Trump administration asked the 9th Circuit court of appeals to rule on the lawsuit barring a decision from the district judge assigned to the case. They set a deadline for Saturday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Now, according to the LA County registrar\u2019s office, at least 18 counties across the state have received similar letters. They have been given a 48 hour deadline to provide identifying information corresponding with ballots that the federal government believes were sent to noncitizens illegally registered to vote. The letter requests that county officials also sequester any ballots where citizenship cannot be verified.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cAny election official who knowingly processes the ballot of a noncitizen is opening themselves to legal jeopardy,\u201d said First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli.<\/p>\n<p>\tMore articles<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ms.now\/author\/the-associated-press\" aria-label=\"View posts by The Associated Press\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"176\" height=\"176\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/1792820412_399_AP.webp\" class=\"avatar avatar-176 photo byline__author_image wp-post-image\" alt=\"\"\/>\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Los Angeles (AP) \u2014 Federal prosecutors sent letters to county registrars across California on Friday demanding that local&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":506220,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8],"class_list":["post-506219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506219","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=506219"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506219\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/506220"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=506219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=506219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=506219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}