The Justice Department failed its legal test in California courts

By Adele Rutherford · Reporting from Atlanta · October 30, 2026

The United States Department of Justice is wrong. It is wrong not because of the goal of ensuring only citizens vote, but because it attempted to dismantle the machinery of a live election using a process it could not prove. When the government asks a court for an injunction—a court order requiring a party to cease a specific action—it must bring a credible record. The Justice Department brought a list of suspected noncitizens that the courts found lacked reliability. To disrupt an election on the eve of the vote based on a flawed list is not an act of law enforcement. It is an act of interference.

A process that fails the record

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2–1 on Friday to reject the government's emergency bid. The Justice Department wanted to set aside mail ballots tied to more than 20,000 California voters. As Axios reports, the majority relied on a lower court finding that the government's process for identifying these voters was "not credible."

U.S. District Judge David O. Carter did not mince words. He warned that the government's actions represented "a broad, ongoing pattern of attempted election interference by federal officials." He found that granting the request would provoke "catastrophic change" and upend the administration of the election.

The government’s numbers shifted as the case progressed. The San Francisco Chronicle notes that federal officials initially claimed more than 190,000 noncitizens were potentially registered. They later lowered that allegation to 20,000. Such volatility in the evidence suggests a political target rather than a legal one.

The weaponization of the subpoena

The legal filings were only one part of the strategy. First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli led an effort to force California to surrender its authority to run its own elections. The San Francisco Chronicle reports that the Justice Department issued subpoenas to local officials in Los Angeles, Orange, Santa Clara, and San Diego counties.

These were not mere requests for information. The Justice Department gave some officials 48 hours to review lists under threat of criminal prosecution. In Los Angeles County, federal prosecutors issued criminal grand jury subpoenas to election officials. These subpoenas demanded they appear in court on November 4, the day after the election.

When the government uses the threat of a jail cell to force a registrar to sequester ballots, it is no longer pursuing the law. It is pursuing a result.

The boundary of authority

The Ninth Circuit's majority, comprising Judge Mark J. Bennett and Judge Gabriel P. Sanchez, focused on the Elections Clause of the Constitution. This clause grants the state and Congress the power to decide how elections are run. The Los Angeles Times reports that the court found the Trump administration was attempting to "misuse" federal statutes to override the Constitution.

The court noted that federal law requires changes to voter lists 90 days prior to an election. This "quiet period" exists to prevent the very chaos the Justice Department invited. This dispute shares a mechanism with Trump v. Anderson. In that case, the federal judiciary had to determine the boundary between state authority to manage candidate eligibility and federal requirements for federal office. Here, the boundary is the state's right to administer its ballots unless Congress explicitly overrides it.

The strongest case for the government came from Judge Patrick Bumatay in his dissent. He argued that stopping California from mixing the ballots of citizens and suspected noncitizens was a "modest remedy." He claimed this would not cancel any vote but would allow time for verification.

This reasoning fails because it ignores the reality of election administration. As the court noted, there is no feasible way to segregate specific ballots without risking the entire system. If we accept "modest" interventions based on "not credible" lists, we create a tool that any future administration can use to target any group of voters they dislike. A rule that only works when your side holds the power is not a rule; it is a weapon.

The Justice Department will likely escalate. Based on the current trajectory, Bill Essayli may use the grand jury probes to issue formal indictments against local registrars after the midterms. The administration may also seek a writ of certiorari from the Supreme Court to review the Ninth Circuit's ruling. However, the record is already clear. The government attempted to use the courts to achieve what it could not achieve through evidence. Legitimacy is a capital stock that spends fast and refills slowly. By treating election officials as criminals and the ballot box as a crime scene, the Justice Department has spent more than it can afford.

The Justice Department failed its legal test in California courts

A process that fails the record

The weaponization of the subpoena

The boundary of authority

Sources