DOJ again demands immediate block on California counting ballots from alleged noncitizens

The Department of Justice (DOJ) asked a federal judge Friday to immediately block California from counting ballots from 20,000 alleged noncitizens after DOJ took the unusual step of appealing its lawsuit before the lower court had a chance to rule.

The request is the DOJ’s latest escalation in its ongoing battle with California election officials. 

California opposed the request Friday, calling it premature because a court hearing on the temporary restraining order request is already scheduled for Tuesday.

The DOJ argued in Friday’s filing that the district court judge must block California from counting ballots from the voters at issue until the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has a chance to review the federal government’s request for a temporary restraining order. 

The order is necessary “because every minute of processing that occurs without segregating the ballots of suspected non-eligible voters causes untraceable disenfranchisement and dilution of the votes of United States citizens,” DOJ claims. “Once illegally cast ballots are counted and commingled with lawful votes, the resulting harm is impossible to remedy. The urgency is heightened because of the fundamental right to vote and to have one’s lawful vote counted without dilution.”

California opposed the DOJ’s request in a response on Friday “because there are no grounds for such an appeal while the Court evaluates the application for a temporary restraining order.” The district court has already scheduled a Tuesday hearing on the temporary restraining order request.

“The TRO Application has not been denied, either by court order or constructively, and the Court has not failed to rule. Instead, the Court set a hearing on the TRO Application to be held four court days after being assigned this case,” California said.

DOJ had earlier demanded that the district court judge rule on its request for a temporary restraining order by Thursday. When that didn’t happen, DOJ took the highly unusual step of filing an immediate appeal with the Ninth Circuit.

DOJ’s fight with California began last week when it sent local election officials a list of 20,000 people it claims are noncitizens who must be immediately removed from the voter rolls. After California officials rebuffed the demand, the DOJ sued and began arresting people on its list. Now the DOJ is pressing further, attempting to bypass a federal district court judge for not moving as quickly as the Trump administration would like by appealing to the Ninth Circuit.

“The only way to preserve the eroding status quo is for an injunction pending appeal to require segregating the ballots Federal officials have identified as associated with ineligible voters. Otherwise, what is done can never be undone,” DOJ claimed in its latest request.

President Donald Trump has baselessly claimed for years that noncitizen voting is a widespread problem. However, studies have routinely found that it’s something that rarely happens and never at a scale that could flip the outcome of an election.

Nevertheless, the Trump administration has repeatedly pressed states to turn over their unredacted voter rolls, which contain sensitive personal information like Social Security numbers, so federal officials can root out alleged noncitizens. 

On Thursday, Attorney General Todd Blanche threatened to file California-style lawsuits in  “a number of states” demanding that purported noncitzens be removed from voting lists.