Trump DOJ threatens election officials with criminal prosecution over noncitizen voting

President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice sent letters to top election officials in multiple states Tuesday warning they could face criminal prosecution over possible noncitizen voting, escalating the administration’s pressure campaign against state election officials after courts repeatedly rejected its effort to seize unredacted voter rolls.

The letters, sent by Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who leads DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, demand that states explain within five days how they plan to comply with federal voter eligibility laws. 

Copies reviewed by Democracy Docket were sent to Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D) and Nevada Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar (D).

Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson (R), her state’s top election official, wrote on social media that she, too, received such a letter, and called it “truly bizarre behavior” by the federal agency “that is supposed to be protecting civil rights.”

The letters frame routine voter list maintenance as a potential criminal matter, warning that election officials could be prosecuted if they knowingly retain noncitizens on the rolls or allow them to receive and cast ballots.

“Any election officer, including the chief election officer of the state, who knowingly retains noncitizens on the state’s SVRL or facilitates noncitizens in receiving and casting ballots could be subject to criminal liability,” Dhillon wrote.

SVRL means statewide voter registration list. 

The department also demanded a quick response.

“Please respond to this letter within five days,” Dhillon added, asking states to explain how they intend to ensure compliance with federal law “both at the state and local level.”

The letters come as Trump and his allies continue to push restrictions aimed at alleged widespread noncitizen voting — a problem for which they have not produced evidence.

And the move is especially alarming because DOJ’s attached memo also takes direct aim at one of federal law’s key anti-purge protections: the National Voter Registration Act’s 90-day quiet period, which generally bars systematic voter purges close to a federal election. DOJ’s memo claims that the 90-day cutoff “does not apply to the removal of non-citizens who were never eligible to register in the first place,” while acknowledging contrary authority from the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals.

That position could open the door to late-stage citizenship-based purge efforts, exactly when eligible voters have the least time to discover and fix wrongful removals.

The letters also land while DOJ’s voter roll crusade is collapsing in court. The department has lost 11 district court cases and its first appeal in its effort to force states to turn over unredacted voter data. No court has ordered a state to hand over unredacted statewide voter rolls.

Taken together, the letters mark a sharp new phase in Trump’s election agenda. After losing in court on voter data demands, DOJ is now warning election officials that ordinary list maintenance decisions could carry criminal consequences.