20,000 ballots under suspicion: Los Angeles pushes back against Washington's demand

What happened

Nine days before the November 3 election, a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held an hour-long hearing on Sunday on the government's emergency request. The Justice Department wants California Secretary of State Shirley Weber and Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan to hold back the ballots of about 20,000 flagged voters until they prove their citizenship. No ruling has been issued; the panel said it would decide quickly. A district court hearing is also set for October 27.

The government sued on October 15 after a 48-hour deadline expired. On Friday, the department also sent letters to election offices across the state, requesting sensitive data such as Social Security numbers and warning of legal consequences. More than three million ballots have already been cast statewide, and more than half a million in Los Angeles County.

The department's lawyer argued there is good reason to believe the flagged voters are ineligible and that California is not enforcing its own ban. A spokeswoman stressed that the department is not seeking a purge of the rolls but cooperation. The state counters that the list is flawed: a Los Angeles County review of 200 names found that more than 40 percent of the registrations had already been canceled, more than 70 percent had never voted, and nearly four in ten people were born in the United States.

The mood on the ground

According to an AP report published by LAist, election officials are confused, frustrated and rattled. Napa County's registrar sees the move as an attempt to cast doubt on the integrity of the election and said counting will continue. His family, he said, is worried about what might happen to him.

In court, Los Angeles County's lawyer calculated that checking every ballot at three minutes each would take some 140,000 staff hours – about 16 years. State filings call the lawsuit a reckless political stunt, and independent election experts note that the department is breaking with its practice of avoiding interventions in the 90 days before an election.

On the other side, federal officials cite what they call overwhelming evidence that tens of thousands of noncitizens are registered in California. Even a small number of illegal votes could dilute legal ones, argues the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, who warned that officials who do not comply could face prosecution. Shortly before, 28 people on the list had been charged in California with election-related offenses. One Trump-appointed judge remarked that without an injunction, no one would ever know whether noncitizens were voting. Still, UCLA election law expert Rick Hasen wrote after the hearing that the court seemed very likely to reject the request.

Voices from the media