Follow-Up: DOJ Issues Grand Jury Subpoenas to California Election Officials Seeking Records on Detecting Unlawful Voting

The U.S. Department of Justice has issued subpoenas to California state and local election officials as part of a criminal investigation into alleged voting by noncitizens, Reuters reported on October 29. The Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder's office in Los Angeles County, California, received federal grand jury subpoenas last week seeking information about the agency's methods for detecting unlawful voting by aliens and preventing such ballots from being counted, according to copies of the subpoenas seen by Reuters on Thursday.

The subpoenas also seek records related to Los Angeles County's response to a series of Justice Department letters this month. The department has filed a civil lawsuit against California and warned election officials that they risk criminal exposure if they do not verify voters' citizenship status. Federal prosecutors have also sent letters to 57 of California's 58 counties warning local officials to cooperate with investigations into illegal voting or face investigations themselves, according to local reporting.

Orange County Registrar of Voters Bob Page said he received a subpoena on Thursday seeking the unredacted voter registration information for 60 possible registrants. Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan said in a statement on Thursday: "At every step, the US Department of Justice has taken a confrontational, adversarial approach. Election officials are acting in accordance with state and federal law."

Acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter told reporters on Thursday that the Justice Department has charged 156 immigrants with voting or registering to vote unlawfully in a pre-midterm push, and has used subpoenas to state and local election officials to build such cases. A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment on the latest subpoenas but said California and the federal government "agree that noncitizen voting is properly addressed through criminal law." It was not immediately clear whether Logan's office itself is a focus of the investigation.

The subpoenas came a day after U.S. District Judge David Carter 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; the department has appealed the ruling. Before ruling, Carter told department lawyers at a hearing on Tuesday that the court believed any threats to state and county election employees should cease immediately. Lawyers for California have questioned the reliability of the administration's immigration data and argued that the federal government does not have the authority to intervene in its elections; under the U.S. Constitution, states administer elections.

The midterm elections will be held next Tuesday, November 3, and will determine control of Congress. Studies have repeatedly shown that voting by noncitizens is rare and has no impact on election results, while the legal and investigative fight between Washington and California over the voter rolls continues.

Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)

Photo: 图：位于 Washington 的美国司法部总部 Robert F. Kennedy 大楼。APK 摄，CC BY 4.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / The Robert F. Kennedy Department of Justice Building in Washington. Photo by APK, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

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