A top federal prosecutor in California said federal investigators have determined that all 20,000 people they flagged on the state's voter rolls as "likely noncitizens" are not U.S. citizens.

Bill Essayli, the first assistant U.S. attorney for California's Central District, told Fox News Digital that federal investigators have evidence that these 20,000 individuals received mail ballots this month. His office sued California last week seeking a court order to prevent any ballots they return from being counted.

"We're not asking California to take any drastic steps other than to sequester the ballots from the suspected noncitizens," Essayli said in an interview on Wednesday. "We believe it's at a minimum of 20,000. That's the floor."

The potential ceiling, he said, is much larger. Essayli referenced a letter Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin sent to California in July that flagged nearly 200,000 voters as possible noncitizens.

DOJ OFFICIAL DEFENDS TRUMP'S NONCITIZEN VOTER PROBE ON '60 MINUTES,' ACCUSES SHOW OF EDITING OUT HER ANSWERS

Since then, federal investigators have been sifting through those records to identify people they believe they can verify as noncitizens.

He said 20,000 is only the current tally and expects thousands more names to be added in the coming days.

Earlier this week, Essayli got into a social media spat with Gov. Gavin Newsom over the state's safeguards against noncitizen voting.

Essayli argued that California is allowing people without citizenship onto the voter rolls through its supposedly lax verification processes, while Newsom said the state follows all relevant federal law governing the integrity of elections.

In court filings, California election officials have pushed back against the Justice Department's demands, arguing that county election offices lack both the authority and access to federal records needed to verify voters' citizenship status.

They have also said that sequestering ballots from people on the DOJ list is impossible in cases where the ballots have already been processed. Once a ballot's signature is verified, it is removed from its identifying envelope and processed alongside other ballots, meaning it can no longer be traced back to an individual voter.

STATE DEPARTMENT CONSIDERS SHARING PASSPORT RECORDS FOR VOTER CITIZENSHIP CHECKS

"That is true. That's why we're getting an emergency court order requiring them to put those ballots aside," Essayli said. "Ballots have already gone out, people are filling them out and they're being returned in process as we speak. So, the crime is occurring in real time."

The DOJ escalated its push for immediate court intervention Wednesday, asking the judge to rule on its emergency request by noon Thursday. In Los Angeles County alone, officials have already processed 331,000 ballots, according to court records.

Essayli's office filed suit on Oct. 15, roughly two weeks after California sent out mail ballots, including to the possible noncitizens on the DOJ list, according to the federal government.

When asked why the Justice Department didn't act sooner, Essayli explained that investigators did not know exactly which voters would receive ballots until they were sent.

ELECTION CRIME ARRESTS KEEP PILING UP AS DEMS INSIST IT 'JUST DOESN'T HAPPEN'

He said California should cooperate with the federal government to expedite the process of verifying voters' citizenship.

That would involve providing additional identifying information, including driver's license numbers and Social Security numbers when available, that federal investigators could cross-check against government databases.

California and dozens of other states treat this information as confidential and have refused to turn it over to the federal government, prompting the DOJ to take several of them to court.

In a separate lawsuit from Sept. 2025, the DOJ tried to compel California to provide its complete, unredacted voter-registration database, including names, Social Security numbers, home addresses and voting histories.

In January, a district court sided with California and dismissed the case, calling the government's request "unprecedented and illegal." The DOJ appealed the ruling and litigation is ongoing.

MAP IT: DOJ ILLEGAL VOTING CRACKDOWN SWEEPS 17 STATES AS RAZOR-THIN ELECTIONS FACE SCRUTINY

"If California will make available or submit its records, we can quickly put them through our established systems to determine who's a citizen and who's not," Essayli told Fox News Digital. "They're forcing us to do it the hard way, which we're willing to do because this is very important."

He said every person on the current 20,000-name list was individually reviewed by a federal employee at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and Homeland Security Investigations.

California officials, however, have questioned the reliability of the DOJ list.

Monica Flores, an assistant registrar-recorder in Los Angeles County, said in a court declaration that her office conducted a preliminary review of a sample of 200 records from the list that were associated with LA County addresses.

Of those, 112 corresponded to canceled or inactive voter registrations, meaning no ballot was mailed to those individuals for the November election, Flores said.

TRUMP ADMIN WANTS TO REQUIRE TAX FILERS TO DISCLOSE CITIZENSHIP STATUS TO IRS

"I don't believe that, actually," Essayli said. "The information we have is that they likely received ballots. So we are asking for the names of people they claim whose registration has been canceled."

Essayli added LA County did not say when these registrations were canceled. He raised the possibility at least some were canceled after federal officials provided the state with their list.

"If they're canceling now based on the records we provided, that's great news," Essayli said. "But that's all to be determined."

In the 200-person sample reviewed by LA County, Flores said that among records where birthplace was "meaningfully reported," 38.9% indicated the person was born in the United States, which she called "strong evidence of citizenship."

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Essayli similarly disputed this conclusion, arguing that the birthplace information — much like the citizenship information itself — was provided by the registered voters themselves.

"They're not independently checking any of this information," Essayli said. "They're going off the information that was provided to them by the person who registered to vote."

The California Secretary of State's office and the LA County Registrar-Recorder's office did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital's requests for comment.

Essayli said that his office is determined to follow through with its investigation because "one noncitizen voting is too many."

"One illegal vote cancels out the vote of an American citizen. There are a lot of local elections that are decided on very few votes," he said. "Noncitizens cannot vote in federal elections, and we intend to enforce that law."

A Biden-appointed federal judge in California ruled Wednesday that the Department of Homeland Security must halt certain investigations into suspected illegal voting, citing concerns over voter intimidation.

U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín, the jurist in question, was born in Mexico and nominated to the federal bench by President Joe Biden in 2022. Before becoming a federal judge, Martínez-Olguín spent about six years at the American Civil Liberties Union, a progressive civil rights organization, where she worked on women's and immigrants' rights issues.

The activist groups suing DHS "demonstrate[d] that they are likely to succeed in their claim that Defendants have run afoul of the Voting Rights Act’s prohibition of intimidating voter assistance and mobilization," according to Martínez-Olguín.

DOJ OFFICIAL DEFENDS TRUMP'S NONCITIZEN VOTER PROBE ON '60 MINUTES,' ACCUSES SHOW OF EDITING OUT HER ANSWERS

The public’s "interests in safe elections, free from interference or intimidation, far exceed (the government’s) purported interest in combating unlawful voting by non-U.S. citizens," she added.

The Trump administration, meanwhile, maintained that noncitizen voting in federal elections is a crime and that DHS has statutory authority to investigate suspected violations. Martínez-Olguín did not find investigating noncitizen voting as itself unlawful, but instead argued that DHS’ methods likely violate the law as it used unreliable source data and sent armed agents to homes to conduct interviews, which could constitute intimidation.

STATE DEPARTMENT CONSIDERS SHARING PASSPORT RECORDS FOR VOTER CITIZENSHIP CHECKS

Lawyers representing the federal government conceded that some American citizens may have been looked at in connection with DHS’ investigations, but contended that in-person interviews were "expressly designed to resolve the discrepancies."

Noncitizen voting is rare, but cases of illegal voting have been documented. News broke earlier this year, for example, that New Jersey erroneously placed over 6,000 non-citizens on its voter rolls. The Justice Department announced charges against 16 individuals in September, including noncitizens accused of voting illegally in federal elections, and brought additional election-related charges in October.

NEW JERSEY REMOVES 6,600 PEOPLE FROM VOTER ROLLS WHO WERE ELIGIBLE TO CAST A BALLOT FOR 2024 ELECTION

Martínez-Olguín’s order blocks DHS from carrying out certain field investigations into suspected illegal voting involving U.S. citizens in California, Connecticut, Georgia, Missouri, Nevada, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington and Wisconsin. Several of those states are led by Democrats who have opposed the Trump administration's immigration enforcement policies, and some face high-profile elections in November.

Cracking down on illegal voting has been a priority for the second Trump administration, though it has yet to produce evidence of widespread noncitizen voting.

The judge delayed enforcement of her order until Friday, giving the Trump administration time to appeal, and set the restrictions to expire on Election Day unless otherwise ordered.

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"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," a spokesperson for the department told Fox News Digital. "We have no plans to question or investigate people we believe to be U.S. citizens."

House Democrats' No. 3 leader is under fire for his opposition to voter ID in his home state of California.

House Democratic Caucus Chairman Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., spoke at a press conference earlier this month criticizing a measure on Californians' ballot this Election Day that, if passed, would mandate that voters show government-issued photo ID at the polls.

He made the comments just weeks before the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced a crime bust that saw several U.S. permanent residents accused of registering to vote despite not being citizens.

MAP IT: DOJ ILLEGAL VOTING CRACKDOWN SWEEPS 17 STATES AS RAZOR-THIN ELECTIONS FACE SCRUTINY

Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif., hammered Aguilar's opposition to voter ID and argued the DOJ's recent actions made it "obvious" that the ballot measure, called Proposition 39, was needed.

"Give me a break," Calvert told Fox News Digital. "You have to show an ID to board an airplane, cash a paycheck, rent an apartment or even buy cold medicine at the grocery store. Democrats claiming that requiring photo ID before casting a ballot is somehow 'racist' or 'voter suppression' is complete nonsense and an insult to every voter's intelligence."

NEW YORK CITY’S LONE REPUBLICAN IN CONGRESS ACCUSES MAMDANI, SCHUMER OF 'HYPOCRISY' IN VOTER ID FIGHT

Rep. Vince Fong, R-Calif., said voter ID "is basic election security that the vast majority of Americans support, and 36 states already require."

"While opponents are resorting to lies and fearmongering, Proposition 39 is commonsense reform in a world where you need an ID to rent a car, stay at a hotel, open a bank account or board a flight," Fong told Fox News Digital. "The DOJ's recent voter fraud bust in California is exactly why these safeguards matter."

Rep. Young Kim, R-Calif., similarly said showing photo ID is a "simple standard we already require to board a plane, purchase alcohol or pick up a prescription."

"This isn't controversial and it shouldn't be complicated. Our elections deserve at least as much consideration as a beer or a bottle of wine," Kim told Fox News Digital.

Aguilar, meanwhile, criticized Proposition 39 during a press conference with Democratic gubernatorial candidate and former Biden administration Cabinet Secretary Xavier Becerra earlier this month.

"We will not stand for this, because we will not stand for people to lose an opportunity to exercise their ability to vote. In Arizona, they tried this. They wanted folks to put their driver's license numbers on their ballots. Think about that. What if you miss one digit? Your vote doesn't count?" Aguilar proposed. "What if you're married in California? What if you're married, and you haven't changed your name and you go to vote? No longer will you be able to vote. That is what is at stake for Californians."

SCHUMER SAID 'DEMOCRATS SUPPORT VOTER ID' – THEN EVERY SENATE DEMOCRAT VOTED AGAINST GOP BILL

He called it a "voter suppression effort" pushed by Republicans.

"Republicans can win only when they suppress the vote. Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans know that they are bankrupt of ideas and solutions, and so they have to change the rules of the game," Aguilar said.

NEWSOM SPARS WITH TRUMP-APPOINTED PROSECUTOR OVER 20,000 SUSPECTED NONCITIZENS ON VOTER ROLLS

Meanwhile, the California government criticized the DOJ's operation while pointing to reports that said more of those charged were registered as Republicans rather than Democrats.

"For nearly a decade, Trump has baselessly alleged mass voter fraud rings were employed by Democrats and utilized 'illegal immigrants' to sway elections across the country – often pointing to California," a release on Gov. Gavin Newsom's state website read. "Courts at all levels have rejected the claims of vast voter fraud or that elections were rigged against the President."

Voter ID laws currently exist in 36 states and polls have shown they have a majority of Americans' support.

But in Congress, several efforts to pass federal voter ID legislation have been thwarted by Democrats in recent years.

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Fox News Digital reached out to Aguilar's campaign for a response to his GOP House colleagues' comments.

Muslim leftist Michigan U.S. Senate candidate Abdulrahman El-Sayed on Wednesday rejected requiring proof of citizenship and voter ID for elections, calling GOP-led efforts to secure U.S. elections "about voter suppression."

The post Michigan Debate: El-Sayed Claims SAVE America Act ‘About Voter Suppression’ appeared first on Breitbart.

"Those who are here legally and are not breaking other laws have nothing to fear," a DHS spokesperson said.

The post Report: Federal Agents Knock on Doors to Crack Down on Noncitizens Voting Ahead of Midterms appeared first on Breitbart.

A “massive concession” claim emerged Tuesday in the federal dispute over California’s voter rolls after Los Angeles County officials told a court they cannot independently verify voters’ citizenship beyond what voters state on their registration forms.

The post Federal Prosecutor Says L.A. County Made ‘Massive Concession’ on Voter Citizenship Checks appeared first on Breitbart.

Early voting in two Republican strongholds puts Latino voters’ priorities and President Donald Trump’s declining approval under scrutiny.

Early voting began Monday in Texas and most Florida counties, setting the stage for closely watched midterm contests in two Republican strongholds where Latino voters’ concerns over inflation, immigration and public safety could shape the electoral landscape.

RELATED: Cuba Accuses United States of Pressuring UN Votes on Blockade

With Latinos accounting for 40% of Texas’ population and 28.7% of Florida’s, both states offer a key test of the parties’ ability to attract Hispanic voters. Economic pressures, rising living costs, immigration policy and public safety are among the issues shaping voters’ priorities.

In Florida, voters turned out early in heavily Hispanic areas, including Miami-Dade County and Doral. Their concerns varied: some pointed to rising food and fuel prices and the strain on households and small businesses, while others emphasized public safety, education and support for the Trump administration.

Foreign policy and immigration have also exposed divisions within the community. In Doral, home to a significant Venezuelan population, tensions over the conflict with Iran and its potential impact on oil prices have added to debate over the administration’s tougher immigration policies.

Text Reads: 🗳️ U.S.: Early voting has begun in Texas, joining Georgia and Arizona. The November 3 elections will determine control of Congress.

The early voting period coincides with a decline in Trump’s approval among Hispanic voters, according to a recent Pew Research Center study. His approval rating stood at 24% in October, down from 38% in February 2025, at the beginning of his term.

The figures come as both parties compete in high-profile state and congressional races. In Florida, Republican Byron Donalds and Democrat David Jolly are vying for the governorship in a contest that has proved closer than expected. Republican Representative María Elvira Salazar is seeking re-election in the state’s 27th Congressional District against Democratic challenger Eliott Rodríguez.

In Texas, Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton faces Democrat James Talarico in the Senate race, while Republican Governor Greg Abbott is challenged by state legislator Gina Hinojosa.

Democrats are hoping that declining support for Trump among Hispanic voters, combined with greater participation in early and mail-in voting, will help them contest key seats in the House of Representatives and Senate. Republicans, meanwhile, are seeking to maintain their dominance in both states through the end of the voting period.

Lengthy meeting heard grumbles about ‘blue wall’ policies and ‘Ming vase’ tactics but no real rancour

As political showdowns go, this week’s gathering of Liberal Democrat MPs, billed by some as a crunch moment for Ed Davey, was a touch underwhelming. “I had expected a damp squib,” one attender put it. “It was damper than I thought.”

Far from generating a mass of opposition to Davey’s leadership, let alone a formal challenge to his position, the lengthy gathering in a Commons committee room on Tuesday evening brought a few minor grumbles, but little else.

Nearly 3,000 events nationwide urged voters to cast ballots early ahead of November 3 elections that will determine control of Congress.

The No Kings movement held nearly 3,000 rallies and marches across the United States on Saturday, urging voters to cast their ballots early in the November 3 midterm elections, as the Trump administration intensified its efforts to challenge mail-in voting and scrutinize ballots cast by suspected noncitizens.

RELATED: Trump’s Attack on Mail-In Voting Seeks to Create an Advantage for Republicans

The nationwide mobilization, held under the slogan “No Kings: Vote Early,” drew millions of participants, according to USA Today, with events in all 50 states and Washington, D.C. The demonstrations came two weeks before elections that will determine whether Republicans retain control of Congress for the final two years of President Donald Trump’s term.

Organizers said the campaign aimed to turn mass mobilization into electoral participation by encouraging voters to make voting plans, cast their ballots early and help protect every eligible vote. They argued that historically high turnout would make it harder for the Trump administration to challenge the results by alleging fraud.

“Across thousands of events in all 50 states and DC today, we are turning enormous people power into direct voter power,” the No Kings Coalition said in a social media statement. It described the initiative as a nationwide effort to encourage early voting and build a network of Americans prepared to defend eligible ballots.

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Text Reads: Demonstrations in Washington, U.S., under the slogan “No Kings: Vote Early,” seek to channel political protest into electoral participation. They call for placing limits on President Trump and protecting the Constitution ahead of the elections.

The coalition also pointed to the rising cost of groceries, gasoline, electricity and other daily necessities, arguing that decisions made by political leaders directly shape families’ lives and economic prospects. It presented the early-voting campaign as the next step in reclaiming political influence after a year of mass demonstrations.

In Atlanta, city council member Michael Julian Bond urged rally participants to encourage others to vote before Election Day rather than wait until the last minute.

“The Constitution gives you a power. That is the power of the vote,” Bond told the crowd.

In Phoenix, Arizona, Democratic Senator Rubén Gallego linked the campaign to opposition to the Trump administration’s policies, accusing the president and congressional Republicans of worsening economic conditions for ordinary Americans while enriching their allies.

“Today, we voted early to send a message loud and clear: no to separating our families, no to corruption, no to no oligarchs, no to stupid forever wars, and no kings.,” Gallego wrote on X.

Democratic Representative Yassamin Ansari, who also attended the Phoenix rally, called the upcoming election “the most important election of our lives.” She cited the administration’s deportation policies, the war in Iran, cuts to health care and food assistance, and widespread corruption allegations as central issues facing voters.

Ansari questioned whether Americans would accept immigration enforcement practices that frighten communities and separate families, policies that leave millions without health care, or what she described as a transfer of wealth from working people to billionaires.

The protests unfolded amid heightened political tensions over Trump’s deployment of military personnel to several cities governed by Democrats. The administration has justified the deployments as a way to combat crime and support immigration enforcement operations.

The demonstrations were backed by a broad coalition of organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Federation of Teachers, Black Voters Matter Fund, Indivisible, MoveOn, Public Citizen, State Voices and Voto Latino.

The push for early voting also came as the Trump administration pursued legal action against mail-in ballots. Trump has repeatedly attacked mail voting and continued to claim, without evidence, that electoral fraud cost him the 2020 presidential election.

On Thursday, the administration sued California election officials, asking a judge to bar the state from counting mail-in ballots in the midterm elections cast by people the federal government considers likely to be noncitizens until their immigration status can be verified.

On Friday, the Justice Department warned local election officials that processing and counting ballots submitted by suspected noncitizens could expose them to criminal investigations and prosecution.

Also on Friday, Democratic Senators Alex Padilla of California, Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Dick Durbin of Illinois wrote to Attorney General Todd Blanche, demanding assurances that the Justice Department would not seize ballots or other election materials before the midterm results were certified.

• Meta says its system detected intense bursts of activity by a Claude tool.
• That triggered an automatic shutdown and locked admins out of the account.
• It happened during a day of rallies promoting early voting in the midterms.

Meta said Sunday that its systems suspended the No Kings movement's Instagram account during its day of action because it detected "intense" activity by a Claude tool.

The account was locked and administrators were denied access for "several hours" during nationwide rallies on Saturday to mobilize early voting in the midterms, the group said.

Meta initially said that an automatic trigger was responsible for shutting down the account "in error," but offered a fuller explanation a day later.

"Our engineering team discovered that the spike that triggered the incorrect enforcement was primarily in the account's 'reading' behavior," spokesperson Andy Stone said in an X post.

"Specifically, our network security systems detected the use of a Claude tool reading profiles, posts, and hashtags, the rate of which sharply increased (~4x volume) in intense bursts on October 17. "

Stone said the activity resembled bot traffic, prompting the system to take the account offline.

"An automated re-review of the removal action an hour later recognized that shouldn't have happened and restored the account. It unfortunately took additional time for us to straighten out the situation with admin access to the IG account.

"We want to reiterate our sincere apology for the error," he wrote.

The No Kings network, which bills itself as nonpartisan but arose last year in response to President Donald Trump's actions, said it held nearly 3,000 rallies across the country to encourage voters to cast their ballots early as a hedge against any effort to undermine turnout.

"Restricting communications about voting in the middle of an election is unacceptable," it said.

"Meta must answer for this suspension and take immediate steps to ensure it never happens again — to any account, but especially those working to inform voters and encourage participation in our democracy."

Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut called for an investigation into the shutdown, saying on Sunday evening that even if it was made in error, the incident was a "total indictment of Meta's outsized influence on our culture and politics."

"If it wasn't malevolence, it was likely a natural consequence of a company that is desperate to get as close to Trump as possible (and thus has a disincentive to do the basic, proactive work to be ready to support users on No Kings Day)," he wrote in a post on X.

The senator, who has advocated for stricter regulation and anti-monopoly laws against Big Tech, said Meta's significant share of the political discourse market comes with a responsibility for it to be ready for "major moments of political action."

October 18, 2026: This story was updated with public comment from Sen. Chris Murphy.

Justice Department actions against state election laws highlight growing national conflict over voter registration lists and mail-in voting security.

Mail-in voting is an established mechanism in the United States election system. It lets eligible citizens cast their votes by mail instead of going to the polling place on Election Day.

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U.S. Justice Department Sues California Over Mail-In Ballots

Over the past decades, state governments have modified vote-by-mail laws to lower administrative costs, increase turnout, and provide alternative access for citizens who face logistical challenges on election days.

In this in-depth article, we will explore the history of mail-in voting, its characteristics, and why the current Trump administration has sought to alter this voting system.

History and the Rationale for Mail-In Voting

Remote voting in the United States dates back to the American Civil War (1861 – 1865). During this war, Union and Confederate soldiers who were away from their districts were permitted to submit written absentee ballots so that deployment would not disenfranchise them.

Throughout the 20th century, the mailing vote expanded beyond military personnel. State governments initially granted absentee ballots to civilians who were ill, physically disabled, or traveling for business on Election Day. Later, lawmakers introduced no-excuse absentee voting, which allowed registered voters to request a mail ballot without providing a specific reason.

In November 1998, Oregon became the first state to conduct all primary elections entirely by mail. By 2000, Oregon conducted the first mail-in presidential election in the U.S., achieving a registered voter participation of over 80 percent. Following Oregon’s model, other states, including Washington, Colorado, Utah, and Hawaii, transitioned to universal vote-by-mail systems after 2020.

Several practical factors explain the implementation of mail-in voting. For voters, it eliminates common obstacles associated with in-person voting, such as work, child care responsibilities, and long lines at precinct polling sites.

For the U.S. administration, state-wide vote-by-mail reduces the need for temporary poll workers, lowers equipment purchases for physical polling locations, and decreases operational expenses on election days.

How Mail-In Voting Works and Its Security Record

Mail-in voting operates through structured legal protocols designed to maintain ballot security and track individual submissions. State election offices verify registered voter addresses and signatures, using databases before mailing official ballot materials.

After a voter completes their ballot, they can return it by U.S. Postal Service or place it in a designated local election drop box. Upon receipt, election workers process the ballot through signature verification procedures.

Empirical research shows that voter fraud in mail-in systems is extremely rare. Academic studies and data compiled by the Brennan Center for Justice indicate that the total rate of mail voting fraud over general elections averages 0.000043 percent, or roughly four cases for every 10 million mail ballots cast.

U.S. State election officials rely on barcoded envelopes, secure chain-of-custody procedures, and signature checks to prevent duplicate submissions and preserve election integrity.

Institutional Mechanics and the 2020 Pandemic Pivot

Mail-in voting requires precise administrative coordination between state election agencies, postal services, and voters. When the U.S. implements universal mail-in voting or no-excuse absentee voting, election authorities cross-reference voter registration databases to ensure accurate residential addresses.

Once ballots are printed, they are mailed to registered voters with instructions, a secrecy sleeve, and a pre-paid or postage-guaranteed return envelope.

Security throughout this process relies on multi-step verification systems. When a voter completes their ballot, they place it inside the secrecy sleeve, seal it within the signature-required return envelope, and sign a legal affirmation printed on the exterior.

Election offices process these returned envelopes by running them through automated sorting machines and optical scanners that capture the voter’s signature. Bipartisan teams of election workers compare the signature against official registration records, such as state driver’s license files or original voter registration cards.

The COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 triggered a transformation in U.S. elections. To prevent viral transmission at crowded indoor polling places, numerous states rapidly expanded mail-in voting options, allowing millions of citizens to vote remotely.

According to reports from the MIT Election Data and Science Lab, the voters by mail grew to 46 percent nationwide in 2020, more than doubling the fraction recorded in 2016. Conversely, the share of voters casting ballots in person on Election Day dropped from 60 percent to 28 percent.

Following the pandemic emergency, several states, including California, Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, and Vermont, permanently codified universal vote-by-mail systems into law, establishing remote ballot delivery as a permanent fixture of their electoral infrastructure.

Partisan Realignment, Demographic Realities, and the Red Mirage

The widespread adoption of mail-in voting reshaped traditional patterns of voter participation and introduced complex dynamics in how election results are reported. 

Despite assumptions that mail-in voting consistently favors a single political party, demographic and class analyses demonstrate that vote-by-mail systems benefit diverse working-class populations across the political spectrum.

Low-wage workers, hourly wage earners, agricultural laborers, and caretakers often lack the schedule flexibility required to stand in long lines during restricted polling hours.

Universal mail-in voting removes these temporal and economic barriers, facilitating participation for working families in both urban centers and rural conservative districts, such as in Utah and Montana, where mail-in voting has enjoyed long-standing bipartisan acceptance.

The differing timelines required to process mail-in ballots also created a phenomenon known as the “red mirage.” Because mail-in ballots require time-intensive signature verification, flattening, and manual extraction before they can be counted, many states process in-person votes first on election night.

This operational sequence frequently caused early vote counts to show a temporary lead for candidates who performed strongly among in-person voters, while subsequent processing of mail-in ballots altered vote totals over the following days.

This structural delay in reporting complete totals became a central focal point in post-election legal disputes and public debates over election administration.

Donald Trump’s Stance and Legal Action Against California

President Donald Trump has maintained a vocal opposition to mail-in voting. In public addresses, Trump has repeatedly alleged that universal mail-in voting systems lead to widespread election fraud and unfair outcomes.

Despite using absentee mail-in voting himself in past state elections, Trump argued throughout his campaigns and current presidency that expanding mail-in voting undermines public trust in election administration.

The Trump administration has taken direct executive actions aimed at curtailing mail ballot access. Policy changes and administrative decisions have altered operational procedures at the U.S. Postal Service, including adjustments to sorting equipment and delivery guidelines.

The Department of Justice filed a federal lawsuit targeting California’s election procedures. California established a universal mail-in voting model by enacting legislation requiring county election officials to send a mail ballot to every active registered voter in the state.

The lawsuit by the federal government argued that California’s system creates risks of unlawful voting and challenged state oversight of its official voter registration lists.

Specifically, the federal complaint alleged that California had failed to conduct proper voter roll maintenance, citing federal lists regarding individuals flagged as noncitizens who were sent mail ballots.

The lawsuit sought a court order to block state election officials from counting certain mail-in ballots ahead of the elections. In response, California state officials, including the Attorney General and Secretary of State, defended the legal validity of universal mail-in voting.

State leaders noted that California law relies on signature matching, secure drop-box monitoring, and continuous voter file updates to verify voter identity and maintain system integrity, while arguing that federal interventions violate laws restricting voter roll changes close to an election. Courts continue to review these challenges regarding federal authority over state-administered election laws.

Mail-in voting Also Shapes Results

Mail-in voting remains an essential tool in modern American election administration. From its origins, mail-in voting has provided voters with a flexible, low-cost option to participate in national and local elections.

While the expansion of vote-by-mail systems during the 2020 pandemic increased overall voter turnout, it also intensified political debate over election administration and security measures.

Although empirical data show that voter fraud in mail-in systems remains extremely rare, legal and political challenges, such as federal lawsuits targeting state mail-in procedures, continue to shape the discussion surrounding electoral access.

The ongoing debates over vote-by-mail illustrate a continuing effort to balance security with public access in the U.S. election system. As states enact laws to regulate, expand, or limit mail ballot procedures, the future of mail-in voting will remain a central topic in discussions about democratic participation and legal policy.

This year, Alaska held its primary elections on August 18.

As per a 2020 ballot measure, Alaska primary voters pick among all qualified candidates for a single office, regardless of party affiliation, and the top four then advance to the general election.

In the U.S. Senate primary, Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan won 41 percent of the vote, while former Rep. Mary Peltola, a Democrat, captured nearly 50 percent.

Dan Sullivan was also the distant third-place finisher—but in this case, it was Daniel J. Sullivan Jr., a retired schoolteacher who is also running as a Republican but is not the same person as Daniel S. Sullivan, the junior U.S. senator for the 49th state.

The presence of dual Dan Sullivans is a headache for Republicans, who have fought to keep Daniel J. off the ballot, concerned he would split their votes and cost their candidate his seat.

"Mary Peltola and Chuck Schumer know they can't beat Senator Sullivan on his record, so they're resorting to deceitful political maneuvers that attempt to trick Alaskans and buy a seat," a Republican spokesman told Fox News.

"We are looking into it," President Donald Trump said this week. "It's a disgrace." In fact, NBC News reported in July that the FBI and Department of Justice had launched an investigation "looking for possible wire fraud or a conspiracy to deprive Alaskan voters of a free and fair elections process, which could be a civil rights violation."

In August, the government apparently issued subpoenas, though Daniel J. later said he had not received anything.

But is what he is doing actually illegal? For that matter, should it be?

Carol Beecher, director of the Alaska Division of Elections, barred Daniel J. from the ballot in June after concluding that he was running "with the purpose of confusing or misleading the electorate and compromising the fairness of the ballot."

But a state superior court reversed that decision. "Despite the Division's assertion that Mr. Sullivan may be excluded from the ballot because he lacks 'good-faith,' there is no statute which provides such a criterion," wrote Judge Thomas A. Matthews. "The concept of 'good-faith,' or pure motive, or bona fide intent is simply absent." The Alaska Supreme Court agreed, keeping both Sullivans on the November ballot.

Granted, it seems extremely likely that Republicans are right, and Daniel J. is running specifically to hurt Daniel S.'s prospects.

"Campaign material metadata reveals that Amber Lee, a progressive consultant, authored a press release announcing [Daniel J.'s] Senate bid," WFMD reported in May.

Daniel J. told The New York Times that he was running as a moderate Republican in an attempt to steer the party away from its MAGA wing. But he also admitted that he had voted for the Democrat in the last three presidential races and for Peltola in her races for the U.S. House.

In Beecher's original order keeping Daniel J. off the ballot, she wrote that Daniel J. had asked to be identified as "Dan S. Sullivan" on the ballot, the same name as the senator's. (Alaska reporter Dermot Cole wrote in July that this was not true: Daniel J. wrote "Dan S. Sullivan" in an email to Beecher but followed up hours later to correct it to "Dan J. Sullivan.")

If Daniel J.'s goal truly is to mislead voters, then that is indefensible. But it's not clear that it's illegal, or whether it should be.

"I am not sure exploiting voter confusion about names is any worse than exploiting their ignorance about policy issues like crime, immigration, and health care," wrote George Mason University law professor Ilya Somin. "Trying to prevent such exploitation through criminal and civil liability is likely to violate the First Amendment. In addition, it would likely end up giving incumbent political leaders broad power to curb speech and control electoral campaigns that they cannot be trusted with."

"This is a case about someone running for office with impure motives who is lucky enough to have a name that could confuse some voters," agreed election law expert Richard Hasen. "I don't see how the government could criminalize his running for office for having impure motives. And if it could do so, then it could be a crime every time that the Republican Party backs a Green Party candidate, or Democrats support a MAGA candidate in a primary in the hopes that the candidate would be weaker against a Democrat in the general election. This stuff happens all the time."

But it's entirely possible that Alaska's ranked choice voting system will solve the problem on Election Day.

After the August open primary, the top four candidates compete on a ranked choice ballot, where voters list the candidates in order of preference. If no candidate gets an outright majority, then the lowest performer is eliminated, and every ballot that picked them first is retallied and applied to their second choice.

As long as every Alaskan who wants to vote for Dan Sullivan—either one—lists both Dan Sullivans as their first and second choices, then the system will take care of any confusion. In the (highly likely) event that Daniel J. does not capture a majority on the first ballot, his votes will be retallied and applied to their second choices. The only plausible hiccup is if Peltola, the Democratic candidate, wins a majority in the first round—in which case either Sullivan would have lost anyway.

Of course, Republicans have opposed the ranked choice system since Alaska adopted it. Former Gov. Sarah Palin, who ran against Peltola twice unsuccessfully, said ranked choice was "so weird" that "it results in voter suppression."

In a post last week on Truth Social, Trump called ranked choice voting "Corrupt" and said it "shouldn't be allowed in our Country."

"I just left Alaska, where we have a real bad thing," Trump said Wednesday at a campaign rally in Arizona. "They have the ranked choice voting, where you go into I guess some kind of a test tube or something, and they pick whoever the hell they want. That's another disgrace."

As ever, it's not clear what Trump was talking about. And despite Republicans' complaints, ranked choice voting works quite well: According to the American Bar Association, recent research finds that it "is an improvement over plurality voting with clear benefits in terms of representation, campaign quality, mobilization, and turnout." It also "encourages greater consensus building as well as more civil political campaigns," and voters find it easy to understand.

In the event that a political party finds itself, for example, with two Dan Sullivans on the ballot, ranked choice voting is a perfect solution. If only the party weren't so hostile to it.

The post What Happens When 2 Dan Sullivans Run for the Same Senate Seat? appeared first on Reason Magazine.