Federal judge limits DHS voter operations targeting noncitizens in nine states
A California judge barred DHS agents from questioning people they suspect are U.S. citizens weeks before the election, saying the effort likely violated the Voting Rights Act.
At a glance
- A federal judge limited DHS voter investigations in nine states, saying the effort likely violated the Voting Rights Act.
- The order bars agents from targeting people they know or suspect are U.S. citizens, or acting solely on USCIS data matching.
- It takes effect Friday and runs through election night; DHS says it targets only noncitizens who vote illegally.
A federal judge in California has restricted Department of Homeland Security field operations aimed at finding noncitizens who voted illegally, ruling that the pre-election effort likely violated the Voting Rights Act and relied on flawed data.
U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín, appointed by President Joe Biden, issued a 19-page order late Wednesday. It bars DHS officers in nine states from conducting field operations against people they "know, suspect, or should reasonably know or suspect are U.S. citizens," or operations based "wholly" on data matched by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services without further investigation.
The order is set to take effect Friday and remain in force through election night. The federal government could appeal.
What the judge found
In recent weeks, armed Homeland Security Investigations officers have carried out field operations and visited homes to interview people suspected of illegally voting as noncitizens. According to the ruling, targets can include people who became citizens but voted before they naturalized.
Martínez-Olguín wrote that the government used "flawed" data, and that its use of unreliable and incomplete data along with highly publicized arrests "lead to an objectively reasonable fear of law enforcement entanglements that intimidates citizens from urging or aiding others in exercising their right to vote."
She pointed to a disclosure last month from a USCIS whistleblower alleging rushed efforts to match data and build a target list of potential noncitizens on voter rolls that includes U.S. citizens, and to HSI social media posts, including one that showed agents handcuffing a California man accused of unlawfully registering to vote.
Documents produced in the case and CNN reporting indicate field operations were planned in California, Connecticut, Georgia, Missouri, Nevada, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington and Wisconsin.
Government response
In a declaration, USCIS official Nicolas Bartell told the judge his team manually reviews records before referring them to HSI, but acknowledged a "low possibility" that citizens could be "erroneously identified as potential aliens" in federal records. He wrote that safeguards mitigated the risks and that any remaining risks "were outweighed by the need to support the agency's law-enforcement and election-integrity mission."
DHS said in a statement: "DHS is laser focused on identifying, prosecuting, and removing aliens who vote and dilute the votes of U.S. citizens. ONLY Americans should elect American leaders." The agency added that it has "no plans to question or investigate people we believe to be U.S. citizens."
It is unclear how much the order will affect the campaign. State reviews and audits have consistently found voting by noncitizens to be extremely rare.
Lawsuit and related action
The ruling came in a lawsuit filed last month by a coalition including San Francisco and Santa Clara counties, the city of San Francisco, nursing unions and the Voto Latino Foundation. Protect Democracy and the National Immigration Law Center are litigating the case against DHS and the Department of Justice.
"Today, the courts affirmed a vital principle of our democracy: Voting is a fundamental right that citizens — whether born here or naturalized — should be able to exercise without armed government agents harassing them," said Beau Tremitiere, a lawyer with Protect Democracy. He added that DHS "built its lists on bad data, never checked how often it was wrong, and recklessly sent agents to people's homes weeks before an election."
A court filing by the California Nurses Association and National Nurses United described naturalized citizen members who no longer wanted to attend political rallies, sign up as election poll workers or vote in person because of the operations.
Separately, the DOJ is suing California and demanding the state segregate 20,000 ballots from people federal officials say they believe are "likely" noncitizens. A preliminary review of a sample by Los Angeles County election officials found many of those registrations were canceled, inactive or had no voting history, and some pertained to people who indicated they were born in the U.S. On Monday, the DOJ announced charges against 28 green card holders across the state accused of illegally voting or registering to vote.
Source: NPR News.
Questions and answers
- What did the judge rule on DHS noncitizen voter operations?
- U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín barred DHS officers in nine states from field operations targeting people they know or suspect are U.S. citizens, saying the initiative used flawed data and likely violated the Voting Rights Act.
- Which states are affected by the order?
- California, Connecticut, Georgia, Missouri, Nevada, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington and Wisconsin, according to case documents and CNN reporting. The order takes effect Friday and lasts through election night.
- How common is voting by noncitizens in the U.S.?
- State reviews and audits have consistently found voting by noncitizens to be extremely rare, according to the ruling's context in the NPR report.
