US agents arrest 11 in California on alleged illegal voting

Federal agents across California on Oct 19 arrested 11 non-citizens who were charged with crimes including fraudulently registering to vote in US elections, part of a dragnet that the government says bolsters its lawsuit against the most populous state in the run-up to the Nov 3 midterm elections.

The 11 are among 28 green card holders who are in the country legally but have been charged with various voting-related crimes – part of a coordinated effort by the federal government in California “to combat and root out fraud in US elections,” the office of First Assistant US Attorney Bilal Essayli in Los Angeles said in a statement. 

The individuals came to the US from countries including Mexico, Belize, India, Georgia, Tonga and the Philippines. Many of them went on to cast ballots illegally in several elections, the US says.

The arrests are part of a broader standoff between the Trump administration and California’s top elected officials over the accuracy of the state’s voter rolls. The US Justice Department last week sued California for allegedly failing to join an effort to remove 20,000 suspected non-citizens identified by the federal government from the state’s voter rolls.

“California refused to look at that list,” Acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter said in the statement. “Today’s charges show exactly what that refusal puts at risk. California must verify the citizenship of those more than 20,000 registrants before mail-in ballots are counted.”

California Attorney General Rob Bonta, a Democrat who is defending the state in court, has said that any allegation of voter fraud “should be taken seriously and investigated,” his spokesman Walter Garcia said.

“The 28 individuals charged this morning represent a tiny fraction – approximately 0.0001% – of California’s more than 23 million registered voters,” Garcia said. “That’s not evidence of widespread voter fraud, even if the allegations are true.”

The Justice Department on Oct 19 asked the court handling its lawsuit against California to issue a temporary order requiring the state to set aside mail-in ballots from the 20,000 people on the list and take steps to verify their citizenship status before the votes are counted. A hearing on the request has not been set.

Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn issued a statement calling the arrests “voter intimidation” and a “blatant attempt to undermine trust in our midterm elections” 15 days before Election Day (Nov 3).

“These arrests are being used to paint a picture of widespread voter fraud when we know that is not the case,” Hahn said. “California has laws in place to protect the integrity of our elections, and LA County is fully abiding by them.”

The US Justice Department has ramped up arrests for alleged non-citizen voting or voter registrations in the weeks leading up to the midterm elections, filing more than 100 new criminal cases since the start of September, court records show.

US President Donald Trump has claimed without evidence that illegal voting by non-citizens swayed the election against him in 2020. Such cases are relatively rare in the US, studies of past elections have shown.

California officials including Bonta have blasted the Trump administration effort as a baseless attempt to interfere in the election and sow doubt about its potential outcome. The list of suspected non-citizens is also likely inaccurate, the officials have said, and violates privacy rules. BLOOMBERG