Yet another judge shuts down Trump's 'flawed' scheme to obstruct California voters

A federal judge in Washington, D.C. on Monday barred the Justice Department from issuing demands that California election officials set aside ballots of voters on lists of suspected noncitizens, finding the Executive Branch likely violated the Constitution’s Elections Clause.

Chief Judge James E. Boasberg, who has frequently found himself litigating politically charged actions of the Trump administration, granted in part and denied in part a request for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction brought by the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA) and a naturalized citizen, Pedro Trujillo.

He wrote that the executive “has intervened in California’s ongoing election with a bid to change the rules for counting mail-in ballots,” and that “the lists are flawed.”

A CHIRLA expert, whom Boasberg found “well qualified and credible,” compared the DOJ list of about 20,000 suspected noncitizens with the group’s citizen members. He found at least 22 members certainly match entries and 66 more are near-certain matches, with probabilistic matching producing 6,140 members at risk.

Boasberg found the group likely has standing, citing county officials’ reviews of the lists and the costs members and the organization have taken on.

On the merits, he said states and Congress, not the executive, control election procedures, and that 18 U.S.C. § 611(a), a criminal law on noncitizen voting, doesn’t regulate the manner of elections or override state procedures. He called DOJ’s aiding-and-abetting theory a “red herring” and said the government is attempting to “arrogate to the Executive a power that the Elections Clause commits elsewhere.”

The order bars the DOJ from issuing demands to California election officials to segregate ballots or otherwise depart from state procedures based on voters’ inclusion on the lists. Boasberg rejected the plaintiffs’ broader request as vague and set a $1 bond. He didn’t decide a pending DOJ motion to strike and seek sanctions over use of the data.