In summary
The Trump administration is demanding records from Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego counties as it looks for instances of noncitizens voting.
The Trump administration on Thursday sued California and Los Angeles County to try to force elections officials not to count potentially 20,000 registered voters’ ballots, in an extraordinary intervention 19 days before a consequential national election.
Federal prosecutors from the U.S. Justice Department this week wrote to California Secretary of State Shirley Weber and LA County Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan demanding that they verify the citizenship status of a specific list of registered voters, or set aside their ballots without counting them in November.
It’s part of a national push by the Trump administration to find instances of non-U.S. citizens voting illegally in elections. The Department of Homeland Security recently claimed that Nevada had nearly 16,000 non-citizens on its voter rolls; they sent the state the names of only 185 voters, who Nevada officials confirmed were all U.S. citizens.
California sends all registered voters a ballot in the mail; county registrars across the state have already done so ahead of the Nov. 3 election in which Californians will decide on a new governor, 14 statewide ballot measures and several competitive races that will be key to which party controls Congress.
The Justice Department letters, sent to Los Angeles County and Weber by Acting Deputy U.S. Attorney General R. Trent McCotter, gave officials 48 hours to comply with its request to review a thumb drive containing a list of registered voters that federal prosecutors allege aren’t citizens.
On Wednesday, Logan said he hasn’t reviewed the drive because it’s an unsecure format. Weber wrote McCotter saying she had requested data and methodology after federal officials claimed without evidence in July that 190,000 California voters “may be” noncitizens, but that the officials never provided it.
Gov. Gavin Newsom scoffed at the lawsuit on Thursday as “a sad, desperate attempt by Trump to use his politicized Justice Department to try to suppress California voters just three weeks before Election Day” and said the prosecutors’ request to throw out ballots “should scare the hell out of every American.”
“We will continue to carry out free and fair elections in the Golden State — and call out this authoritarian as he tries every play in the dictator’s playbook,” Newsom said in a statement.
He pointed out the request asks local elections officials to violate federal law: The National Voter Registration Act prohibits purging voter rolls within 90 days before an election.
Both federal and California law require residents to be U.S. citizens to register to vote. Voter fraud is extremely rare, numerous studies have found.
California Democrats urge people to vote
The Trump administration’s actions have alarmed state leaders who say they amount to voter intimidation.
“I think that this is very concerning …because it is perceived by so many in California and across this country as a way to deter people from voting,” said Senate President Pro Tem Monique Limon at a rally in Los Angeles for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Xavier Becerra Thursday morning.
“We will continue to defend, to protect the integrity of our elections. California has a robust system of protecting our elections. We check, we verify, and we follow up,” she said.
Becerra did not directly address the federal action in his remarks at his rally but promised to put up a fight against the Trump administration.
“Whether it is voting, whether it is going to work, whether it’s having good schools, or whether it’s protecting our families against ICE mercenaries, we are here, estamos presentes, and we will fight,” Becerra said from El Pueblo de Los Angeles Historical Monument.
But right now our fight is to get the vote out, to make sure everyone understands that our power lies in our vote,” he said.
More subpoenas to Orange and San Diego counties
The lawsuit and Justice Department’s demands come weeks after federal investigators issued grand jury subpoenas to Los Angeles elections officials seeking information on registered voters.
Federal prosecutors also sought information on registered voters in San Diego County, the news outlet inewsource reported, as well as Orange County, according to previously unreported records obtained this week by CalMatters.
Orange County’s registrar of voters received three subpoenas for records about individual registered voters on Sept. 10. Subpoenas for both LA and Orange counties were sent at the request of Southern California’s acting U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli and Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Wheat. They asked local officials to deliver the information to a Department of Homeland Security investigator.
One subpoena sought the full voter file for a redacted list of what appears to be 18 registered Orange County voters including any “attestations regarding citizenship status;” two others sought more detailed records on two separate voters including information about whether they had changed their addresses or party affiliation and “correspondence related to voter registration.”
Orange County Registrar of Voters Bob Page said his office produced the records and hasn’t gotten any further requests or demands from the Trump administration.
“We do not know why the grand jury requested registration records for these individuals,” Page wrote in an emailed statement. “The request for this registration information has had no impact on the administration of the 2026 General Election.”
