US Judge Orders Trump Administration to Stop Demanding California Set Aside 20,000 Ballots

A federal judge has ordered US President Donald Trump's administration to stop demanding that California election officials set aside nearly 20,000 mail-in ballots belonging to people the government suspects may be non-US citizens, adding another legal setback to the administration's efforts ahead of the November 3 midterm elections.

Chief US District Judge James Boasberg ruled on Monday that the federal government's demands exceeded its constitutional authority. He said the administration could not unilaterally impose its preferred procedures on California for verifying the citizenship of registered voters.

"The Executive Branch has likely violated the Constitution's Elections Clause, which commits authority over election rules to the states and Congress alone," Boasberg wrote.

The ruling came amid a series of legal battles over the Justice Department's demand that California separate ballots from approximately 20,000 people identified on a federal list of suspected noncitizens. The administration argued that the ballots should not be counted until the voters' citizenship could be verified.

However, California officials challenged the reliability of the list, saying it contained errors and could include thousands of eligible US citizens. An expert reviewing the list identified at least 22 members of an immigrant rights organisation who were known US citizens, with another 66 members almost certainly included.

The dispute also reached the US Supreme Court, which on Monday rejected the Trump administration's emergency request to force California to set aside the disputed ballots. The unsigned, one-line order contained no recorded dissents.

Earlier, US District Judge David O. Carter had rejected the administration's request, warning that separating the ballots could disenfranchise eligible voters and disrupt the election process. A divided appeals court subsequently upheld his decision.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta criticised the administration's Supreme Court appeal, calling it another attempt to undermine elections and disregard the rule of law.

The Justice Department had argued that separating the ballots temporarily would prevent potentially unlawful votes from being counted while allowing legitimate votes to be verified later.

The controversy has unfolded as California's midterm voting process is already underway. The state has approximately 23 million registered voters, all of whom are mailed ballots. Voting began in early October, and hundreds of thousands of ballots had already been processed.

Although voting by noncitizens in federal elections is illegal under US law, the courts have raised concerns about identifying eligible voters incorrectly and interfering with state election procedures.