California Counties Should Refuse Trump's 48-Hour Ballot Demand

Federal prosecutors want flagged mail ballots set aside mid-count; California already checks every mail ballot before it's counted.

San Bernardino County's registrar got a list Friday with 1,133 names on it. Federal prosecutors called them "likely aliens," NBC News reported. The letter gave the county 48 hours to commit to working with the Justice Department and Homeland Security on sorting citizens from noncitizens. For anyone whose citizenship couldn't be confirmed, First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli asked the county to "segregate — not cancel" their mail ballots.

Similar letters reached at least 18 counties, the Los Angeles County registrar's office said, according to CBS News and the Associated Press. NBC put the number at 57 of the state's 58. Every one of those counties should say no. I don't think a 48-hour demand landing in the middle of a count is built to catch anybody. I think it's built to make millions of voters wonder whether their ballot ended up in the pile.

Look at when it landed. California's more than 23 million registered voters got ballots in the mail earlier this month, and the state says in court filings that more than 330,000 have already been counted, CBS reported. Lawyers for the state say the federal demands could delay certification of the vote and keep citizens from having theirs counted. Election Day is Nov. 3, CalMatters noted.

Noncitizen voting is illegal, and counties should want it caught. Last Monday, the Justice Department showed it already knows how to do that. Every one of the 28 people it charged holds a green card, according to CalMatters. In 22 of those cases, prosecutors say, the person cast a ballot in at least one election; five are accused only of registering, and one filed a provisional ballot back in 2020. Nobody's neighbor had to have a ballot frozen for those charges to be filed.

Attorney General Rob Bonta said that if they're guilty, they should be held accountable. Then he put the number where it belongs. "Twenty-eight out of 23 million registered voters in California is just … a drop in the bucket numerically," Bonta told reporters, according to CalMatters.

Those 28 came from a list of more than 20,000 people whose votes the government has sued to keep from being counted. That's about one name in 700. Look at Nevada to see what a federal list can turn into once somebody checks it. Homeland Security said the state had nearly 16,000 noncitizens on its rolls, then sent Nevada 185 names, and state officials confirmed every one was a U.S. citizen, CalMatters reported.

California already has a step between a mail ballot and the count. Under the secretary of state's regulations, the signature on every mail envelope gets compared with the voter's registration record before the ballot is counted. A signature can be rejected only if two election officials agree, unanimously and beyond a reasonable doubt, that it doesn't match. Then the voter has to be told within 24 hours and given a chance to fix it.

That check confirms the person voting is the person who registered. It doesn't settle citizenship, and it isn't meant to. Citizenship cases belong where the 28 cases went: to prosecutors, one person at a time. California's process has a voter in it. The federal one has a list, a clock and Essayli's warning that any official who "knowingly processes the ballot of a noncitizen is opening themselves to legal jeopardy."

Counties can afford to call that bluff. The department's Civil Rights Division has filed 31 lawsuits trying to pry voter rolls loose from states. It has lost 26 of them and hasn't won one, CBS reported. The 20,000-name case has a hearing set for Tuesday. The administration asked the 9th Circuit to rule before the trial judge does, and at an emergency hearing Sunday, two of the three appeals judges sounded skeptical, CNN reported.

The counties' 48 hours ran out Sunday. The answer is shorter than the letter. If prosecutors think someone on that list broke the law, they can charge that person, the way they charged 28 people last week, and leave everyone else's ballot in the count.

Source: CBS News, retrieved October 24, 2026. Other sources: NBC News, CalMatters, State of California.

From the Handbook: Vote by Mail Deadlines in L.A. County: Every Date for the Nov. 3, 2026 Election