Judge bars Justice Department from threatening election workers to stop processing ballots

A federal judge has barred the US Department of Justice from threatening or coercing election workers to stop processing ballots. The order, issued late on Friday, also bars the department from demanding that local election officials segregate or not count ballots that the federal government deems may have been cast by ineligible voters.

The order marks another blow to the Trump administration's efforts to assert control over local elections. It comes after a federal appeals court on Friday rejected the Justice Department's request for California to set aside disputed ballots received in the midterm election — the latest setback for the administration's efforts to assert control over state-run elections.

The administration has alleged that California sent ballots to about 20,000 people who may not be US citizens. It wants the state to set those ballots aside and not count them until citizenship can be verified. California officials say the list is highly unreliable and most likely includes many people who are US citizens.

A district court judge forcefully denied that request on Wednesday and warned that the Justice Department's demands could disenfranchise citizens.

"As the district court found — and we discern no clear error — there is no feasible way to identify and segregate the ballots of specific individuals without potentially catastrophic effects on the entire system," the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel wrote in its 2-1 ruling.

The majority opinion was authored by Judge Mark J Bennett, who was appointed by Donald Trump, and Judge Gabriel P Sanchez, who was appointed by former president Joe Biden. A Justice Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the ruling. But in a statement about the sweeping efforts to root out noncitizen voting, the department said: "Federal law prohibits noncitizens from voting. Enforcing that law is not an agenda item. It is the Department's job."

Millions of people have already voted in California in the midterm election that concludes on Tuesday. Hundreds of thousands of ballots have already been processed. Elections officials have said that processed votes can't be matched back to the voters who submitted them.

Against this backdrop, the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, Bill Essayli, has warned: "Any election official who knowingly processes the ballot of a noncitizen is opening themselves to legal jeopardy." After the federal judge's latest order, that path of threats is now closed, because under the order the Justice Department cannot threaten or coerce election workers into stopping ballot processing.