A federal judge in California has rejected the Justice Department's push for an emergency order to have California segregate roughly 20,000 ballots belonging to individuals the Trump administration has claimed are "likely" noncitizens.
"Never before in American history has the federal government, on the eve of an election, sought to coerce a state and local government to abandon their own Constitutional elections procedures and bend to the will of the Executive Branch," U.S. District Judge David Carter wrote in his Wednesday order.
Regarding the DOJ request for the order to require California to set aside the ballots of those it alleges are likely noncitizens, the judge said it would "wreak havoc and disrupt the election that is already underway, create a chilling effect on election workers and voters alike, and discount the votes of United States citizens."
The judge wrote: "This request violates longstanding constitutional principles mandating that states have control over their elections. If Plaintiff's last-minute request for relief were granted, either party could create chaos for their own political purposes to disrupt the election process. Over 20,000 registered Californians would potentially lose the right that generations of Americans have fought to preserve."
Earlier this month, the DOJ filed suit against California accusing the state of failing to review a list of alleged noncitizens that the Trump administration claimed were sent mail-in ballots for next month's midterm election.
In a court hearing earlier this week, Bill Essayli, a controversial Trump-installed leader of the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Central District of California, argued the administration was simply pushing for the state to be in compliance with federal law barring noncitizens from casting votes.
But state officials and other legal advocates opposing the DOJ lawsuit countered that the litigation violated longstanding Constitutional principles mandating that states have control over their elections -- and could have chaotic consequences for the state in tabulating final vote counts in the weeks ahead.
In court papers filed last week, Los Angeles officials said a preliminary analysis of 200 of the names on the 20,000-person list, included a "high percentage" of individuals who say they were born in the U.S. and many more who have no voting history at all.
Earlier this week, in a 2-1 decision, a federal appeals court panel also rejected a DOJ request for an immediate order demanding California segregate the roughly 20,000 mail-in ballots.
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