Justice Department Sues California to Block Counting Ballots From 20,000 Alleged Noncitizens

The U.S. Department of Justice sued California on Thursday, asking a federal judge to stop the state from counting mail ballots cast by more than 20,000 voters the administration says are likely noncitizens.

The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, follows a 48-hour deadline the department set this week for state and county officials to review a list of suspected ineligible voters and set aside their ballots. Officials did not comply, the department said.

"California election officials were given an opportunity to remove noncitizens from their voter rolls and to sequester ballots returned from suspected ineligible voters. They refused," First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said in the department's announcement.

Because California mails a ballot to every registered voter, the state has already sent ballots to the roughly 20,000 people at issue, according to the department. The lawsuit seeks an order blocking the state from tabulating vote-by-mail ballots from those voters until their citizenship status can be verified.

Secretary of State Shirley Weber, a Democrat, and Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Dean Logan are named as defendants. Weber has said her office was never sent the list, and her office said it asked federal officials over the summer for the methodology behind earlier noncitizen-voter claims and was not provided it, according to news reports.