{"id":507688,"date":"2026-10-25T18:28:20","date_gmt":"2026-10-25T18:28:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/507688\/"},"modified":"2026-10-25T18:28:20","modified_gmt":"2026-10-25T18:28:20","slug":"senator-alex-padilla-weighs-in-on-voter-roll-fight-ca-politics-360","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/507688\/","title":{"rendered":"Senator Alex Padilla weighs in on voter roll fight | CA Politics 360"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ashley<\/a><\/p>\n

With one week left before the midterm elections, California is facing a federal lawsuit alleging that non-citizens were registered to vote, received mail-in ballots, and, in some cases, voted. <\/p>\n

A federal judge is expected to determine the next steps in the case on Tuesday. <\/p>\n

U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla, who previously served as California\u2019s secretary of state, addressed the issue in an interview on California Politics 360. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s the legal, and then there\u2019s the political observation here,\u201d Padilla said. \u201cThe legal [issue is] 28 potential unlawful voters in a state where there\u2019s more than 23 million people registered to vote. So let\u2019s keep it in context. It\u2019s a very, very, very small number. The one that they seem to be highlighting the most is actually a registered Republican. So that\u2019s not lost on me either.\u201d <\/p>\n

Padilla compared the situation to Nevada, where initial claims of widespread voter fraud were later disproven. “Over time, as you looked into each individual, there was an explanation. An explanation in Nevada was that two zero people who unlawfully registered, maybe that\u2019s zero. Maybe it\u2019s just a small handful in California,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

He expressed concern about the timing of the lawsuit. <\/p>\n

“Right before the election, the Trump administration has once again tried to create this chaos, trying to sow confusion and create doubt for an election that by all indicators, not just the polls, but all indicators, are not going to go up for Republicans and Trump allies. So they\u2019re trying to disrupt. That\u2019s my take on it,\u201d Padilla said. <\/p>\n

The Department of Justice has acknowledged that the alleged non-citizens represent a small fraction of California\u2019s voter rolls. However, they argue that even one unlawful vote cancels out the vote of an eligible American citizen. <\/p>\n

Padilla agreed that voter fraud is unlawful but questioned the federal government\u2019s methodology. <\/p>\n

“Part of the questions that we\u2019re asking is this list of 20,000 they asked California to look up and try to address\u2014where is this coming from? And they\u2019re not giving us an answer. They have admitted that their list is going to include a lot of citizens and people who are eligible to vote,” he said. <\/p>\n

He added, “Just as much as I want to keep ineligible people from voting, I also want to make sure that every eligible American is not kept from voting.” <\/p>\n

The lawsuit has highlighted discrepancies in access to immigration records. While the federal government has access to such records, the L.A. County Registrar of Voters stated in court filings that they do not have a way to verify if a registered voter is a non-citizen. <\/p>\n

Padilla explained that California determines voter eligibility during the registration process. “If you\u2019ve done it through the DMV, when you first applied for your driver\u2019s license or your ID, you know, people show up with a birth certificate or a passport to begin that process at the DMV,” he said. “For people who are registering to do a paper registration card, you\u2019re signing under penalty of perjury. And history has shown us that voter fraud is exceedingly, exceedingly, exceedingly rare,” he said. <\/p>\n

He expressed concern that the administration\u2019s actions could disenfranchise eligible voters. “In this administration\u2019s zeal to try to advance their agenda and hold on to power, they\u2019re going to keep eligible people from being able to cast ballots or delay to keep eligible voters from having their ballots counted,\u201d Padilla said. <\/p>\n

The senator also addressed immigration enforcement, calling the administration\u2019s approach “cruel.” Padilla has been traveling the state and visiting various detention facilities in California. <\/p>\n

He described inconsistent conditions in detention facilities and emphasized the need for congressional oversight. “The vast majority of people that are being arrested, detained, or even deported may be undocumented, but they don\u2019t have any violent criminal history. In fact, they\u2019ve been working in jobs that the federal government deems essential,” Padilla said. <\/p>\n

Padilla also discussed the election observer program he helped launch through the U.S. Senate. <\/p>\n

“This is official United States Senate employees, both Democrats and Republicans, staff members who have been legally trained to act as election observers,\u201d he said, noting they will be stationed at polls in states where there is an election for the U.S. Senate (not California this cycle). <\/p>\n

He emphasized the importance of public confidence in elections amid ongoing challenges.<\/p>\n

“The more professionals we can have out in the field, and we\u2019re fanning out at least across nine, ten states to observe Senate races, then I think the better we can mitigate or discourage any shenanigans,” Padilla said. <\/p>\n

KCRA 3 Political Director Ashley Zavala <\/a>reports in-depth coverage of top California politics and policy issues. She is also the host of “California Politics 360<\/a>.” Get informed each Sunday at 8:30 a.m. on KCRA 3.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With one week left before the midterm elections, California is facing a federal lawsuit alleging that non-citizens were…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":507689,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[6361,7,9,8,11751,108756],"class_list":["post-507688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-alex-padilla","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-california-politics-360","tag-voter-roll"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507688","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=507688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507688\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/507689"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=507688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=507688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=507688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}