Governor Gavin Newsom and Bill Essayli, a Trump-appointed federal prosecutor in California, sparred on social media this week about whether the state is doing enough to prevent noncitizens from voting.
Essayli, the first assistant U.S. attorney for California’s Central District, surfaced a court document filed Tuesday in which a Los Angeles County election official said the registrar’s office “is not equipped or authorized to verify voter citizenship because it does not independently house citizenship-related information beyond the voter attestation.”
The official, Monica Flores, made the declaration as part of a Justice Department lawsuit seeking to force California to verify the citizenship of more than 20,000 people the federal government believes are likely noncitizens who were sent mail ballots ahead of this year’s midterm elections.
Essayli called Flores’ statement a “massive concession” that shows election officials take voters’ word on whether they are a citizen.
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“American citizens’ votes are being diluted in California,” Essayli wrote.
In response, Newsom’s press office account on X said California adheres to a 1993 federal law that requires people registering to vote through the DMV to swear under penalty of perjury that they are eligible, including that they are U.S. citizens. Similar attestation requirements apply to federal mail-in voter registration forms.
“May want to brush up on your election law before tweeting,” Newsom’s office wrote in a jab at Essayli. “Perhaps Second Assistant is more apt from now on?”
Essayli fired back by citing two federal statutes that make it unlawful for noncitizens to vote in federal elections.
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The public spat highlighted the central dispute in the lawsuit against California: whether the state should take additional steps to verify the citizenship of voters when the federal government flags potential issues with the rolls.
According to the Justice Department’s complaint, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) cross-checked California voter registration records with federal immigration data.
That investigative process, described by DOJ lawyers as “preliminary,” yielded a list of more than 20,000 registered voters federal investigators identified as likely noncitizens. California voters were mailed ballots beginning Oct. 1.
In its initial complaint filed Oct. 15, the Justice Department asked a federal court to require California to set aside mail ballots associated with people on the list until their citizenship could be verified.
Flores, an official with the LA County Registrar’s Office, argued that doing so is now virtually impossible because once a ballot’s signature is verified, it is removed from its identifying envelope and processed alongside hundreds of thousands of others.
As of Tuesday, the county has processed 331,000 ballots, according to Flores’ statement in court.
She also pointed out that the registrar’s office is “not an investigative agency,” adding that she was unaware of “any state or federal law granting it investigative authority.”
Nonetheless, staff from the registrar’s office reviewed a sample of 200 records from the Justice Department list that had LA County addresses.
“The October list is unreliable: 112 of the 200 records correspond to registrations that are canceled or inactive,” according to Flores’ statement. “Of the voters where birthplace was meaningfully reported, 38.9% indicate that they were born in the United States, which is strong evidence of citizenship; and 71.2% of the records have no voting history.”
In a statement to Fox News, Essayli said these reported numbers “are meaningless because, by their own admission, they have no way to verify anyone’s citizenship status or their birthplace.”
There are indications that the Justice Department list does contain at least some individuals who could have broken the law.
On Monday, the Justice Department charged 28 individuals off that list, all lawful permanent residents, with making false statements on naturalization applications and fraudulently registering to vote. Most of them cast unlawful ballots in elections, officials said.