Follow-Up: DOJ Sends 48-Hour Ballot-Segregation Letters to 57 California Counties, Warning Officials of Criminal Liability as Counties Push Back

California — The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) on Friday, October 23, expanded its intervention in California's ongoing election, sending a new round of demand letters to county election offices across the state. The letters give counties 48 hours to set aside mail-in ballots cast by voters the department believes are suspected noncitizens, and to work with the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to identify who on the accompanying lists is a citizen and who is not. The Associated Press reported that at least 18 counties received letters. According to the Los Angeles Times, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Los Angeles said 57 of California's 58 counties had been served, the sole exception being Los Angeles County, which had already received a similar notice.

The letters warn that election officials who knowingly count ballots cast by noncitizens could face criminal liability. According to CNN, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli wrote in a letter to San Bernardino County officials that persons who knowingly tabulate ballots cast by individuals identified by federal agencies as noncitizens risk becoming aiders and abettors to a federal crime. Essayli said in a statement that any election official who knowingly processes the ballot of a noncitizen is opening themselves to legal jeopardy. Posting on social media on Friday evening, he wrote that California does not verify citizenship status, that federal officials had done the work for the counties by obtaining the registered voter list and telling them who the government believes are noncitizens on their rolls, that knowingly processing noncitizen ballots is a federal crime, and that authorities will hold election officials accountable.

The lists vary in size by county. According to the Los Angeles Times, U.S. Attorney Craig Missakian of the Northern District of California wrote to Contra Costa County Clerk-Recorder and Registrar of Voters Kristin Connelly that he was providing a subset of 407 "likely aliens" drawn from the broader statewide list of about 20,000 voters, and demanded that she commit within 48 hours to working with Justice Department and Homeland Security officials to identify which of the 407 are citizens and which are not. The letter sought the nonpublic information associated with each suspected noncitizen's registration, including a Social Security number, a copy of a state ID or driver's license or the information on it, a copy of the voter registration application, and copies or lists of documents presented at registration. Missakian wrote that the letter was meant to make unmistakably clear the legal implications of continuing to send vote-by-mail ballots to people on the list or tabulating ballots cast by them until citizenship can be verified.

Some letters were delivered in person. Santa Cruz County Clerk Tricia Webber, president of the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials, said two people with Justice Department credentials came to her office on Friday and handed her a manila envelope containing a letter demanding that she determine the citizenship of 81 people in her county within 48 hours. She said most counties, if not all, were doing what she was doing — sitting down with county counsel and going over everything — and that this was not normal protocol.

County election officials pushed back. Connelly said she had not yet responded as of late Friday and was in contact with her county counsel and colleagues around the state. She said the nonpartisan Contra Costa County Elections Division administers elections according to all state and federal election laws and the U.S. and California constitutions, that its work is observable, and that the threat was not helpful and was intended to intimidate. According to Democracy Docket, the San Diego County Registrar's office said in a statement that the county had received the request and was evaluating next steps, noting that under state elections code the Secretary of State is responsible for determining voter registration eligibility. The statement said there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in San Diego County or in California, and that voters can cast their ballots with confidence and without fear. Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Dean C. Logan emailed fellow association members condemning the new letters as misrepresenting facts and threatening election officials twelve days before the election through a posture of intimidation, called the 48-hour deadline unenforceable, and noted that the department was demanding individual-level data it had previously obtained only through subpoenas.

U.S. Senator Alex Padilla of California said in a statement on Friday that "this is not a drill" and that President Trump and Attorney General Todd Blanche were trying to interfere in California elections. He said the Justice Department had provided no evidence for its claims of massive voter fraud and had admitted the data it points to is inaccurate and unreliable, that the department does not have the authority to interfere, and he told local election officials, "We have your back." The office of U.S. Representative Mark DeSaulnier issued a statement echoing Connelly's commitment to secure, free and fair elections and expressing deep concern over the escalating weaponization of the Justice Department to interfere with the November 3 election. According to the Los Angeles Times, the Justice Department did not respond to its inquiry, and the office of California Attorney General Rob Bonta declined to comment.

The letters are the latest escalation within a week in the federal-state election dispute. As GSM previously reported, Acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter wrote on October 13 to Secretary of State Shirley N. Weber and Los Angeles County Registrar Dean C. Logan with a similar 48-hour demand and a password-protected thumb drive containing names. On October 15 the Justice Department sued California, seeking to block the counting of more than 20,000 mail-in ballots linked to suspected noncitizens. On October 22 the department asked the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to intervene before the district judge ruled, and a hearing in the case is scheduled for next week.

The New York Times further disclosed on October 24 the letter's own wording: for those whose "citizenship status cannot be confirmed, we request that you immediately instruct the appropriate elections official to segregate — not cancel — those individuals' vote-by-mail ballots until their citizenship status can be determined," and warned that counties that failed to comply could face "significant federal scrutiny."

The same day, after voting in Florida, Trump spoke about the Justice Department's inquiry into California's voter rolls, saying the figure "could be as high as a million votes" and that the previously cited 20,000 was "just a little bit" and related to the past election rather than the current one. That characterization is Trump's own, as reported by the New York Post.

In its request for Ninth Circuit intervention, the Justice Department argued that every minute of ballot processing without segregating the ballots of suspected ineligible voters would cause untraceable disenfranchisement and dilution of citizens' ballots. Logan also noted that the county's review of the roughly 20,000-name list found many of the people tied to addresses across California, not only within Los Angeles County.

Previously from GSM: Follow-Up: DOJ Appeals California Ballot-Segregation Case to the 9th Circuit

Source: GSM · America

Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)

Photo: 图：加州 Mendocino 县的官方选举选票投递箱（资料图）。图片：Sarah Stierch，CC BY 4.0，取自 Wikimedia Commons。

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