US appeals court again rejects Trump bid to set aside California ballots

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals refused to remove or segregate 20,000 California ballots that the Trump administration labeled as belonging to likely non-citizens. The majority ruled that the request would violate the Constitution’s Elections Clause and risk disenfranchising eligible voters. This was the administration’s second unsuccessful appeal in less than a week.

The court said the request went beyond temporarily separating questionable ballots. It could ultimately cancel ballots and remove voters from the rolls. Judges Mark Bennett and Gabriel Sanchez formed the majority. Trump appointee Patrick Bumatay dissented and called the request reasonable. A lower court had also rejected the administration’s case.

The ruling kept the ballots within California’s vote count unless another legal decision changed that outcome. The court also stressed that election administration belongs primarily to states. The dispute highlighted concerns about inaccurate voter lists and the danger of acting on unverified citizenship claims shortly before an election.

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals is a federal appellate court in the United States. It reviews decisions made by federal trial courts within its assigned region. The article identifies it as the court that considered the Trump administration’s emergency requests involving California ballots. It is one level below the US Supreme Court.

An appeals court usually examines legal arguments, the trial court’s record, and whether the law was applied properly. It does not normally hear witnesses or conduct a completely new trial. In this case, the 9th Circuit reviewed a lower court’s rejection of the request to set aside ballots. Its judges issued a majority ruling, while one judge dissented.

The court’s decision mattered immediately because fewer than four days remained before the November 3 election. Its ruling prevented the administration from obtaining the requested emergency relief. The case also showed how appeals courts can limit government action when it conflicts with constitutional rules or threatens voting rights.

The Trump administration challenged 20,000 California mail-in ballots, claiming the recipients were likely non-citizens. That figure is substantial in a legal dispute, but the article does not provide California’s total electorate, total ballots cast, or total registered voters. Without one of those totals, the challenged ballots cannot be converted into a reliable statewide percentage.

The article does provide a different scale comparison. California was scheduled to elect 52 members of the House of Representatives on November 3. The administration’s list was sent barely three weeks before the election, creating pressure to act quickly. California officials refused to set aside the ballots without proof that the names belonged to foreign nationals.

The missing statewide denominator matters. A raw number can sound large without showing its share of all voters. The court focused less on the size of the list than on the risk of wrongly canceling eligible votes. The article also reports that officials in Nevada and Washington found similar lists largely inaccurate.

The court said segregation was not merely a temporary sorting step. If officials treated the list as reliable, ballots could ultimately be canceled and the named voters could be removed from registration rolls. That creates a direct risk that eligible citizens would lose their votes because of an incorrect label.

The article gives several examples of why that risk mattered. California said the administration provided no proof that the listed people were foreign nationals. In Nevada, officials said citizens had been wrongly identified as non-citizens, and not a single name on one list was correct. Some people charged in California also said they had never registered to vote.

The majority therefore treated disenfranchisement as a public-interest danger. It refused to undermine the Elections Clause just days before voting. The decision shows why election officials and courts must verify individual records before taking action that could cancel ballots or affect a person’s registration.

The administration’s main evidence was a list of nearly 20,000 people it labeled likely non-citizens who had received California mail-in ballots. California officials requested proof that the listed names actually belonged to foreign nationals. According to the article, the administration had not provided that evidence when the case was decided.

The list’s accuracy was questioned by officials and reporting. Nevada authorities said the administration had mistakenly identified citizens as non-citizens, and not one name on its list was correct. In California, 28 foreign nationals were charged with election-related infractions, but some defendants told the Los Angeles Times they had never registered to vote. The newspaper found that some accused people shared names with eligible voters.

Those problems weakened the claim that the entire list represented unlawful voters. The article also notes that non-citizen voting and election fraud are extremely rare. The court therefore rejected a broad remedy based on uncertain records, especially so close to the election.

The Constitution’s Elections Clause is the provision the court used to frame the dispute. The article says it grants states exclusive authority to administer elections, while allowing Congress to pass regulations concerning voting procedures. That division matters because election administration is generally handled by state officials, not directed unilaterally by the executive branch.

California officials received the administration’s list and refused to set aside the ballots without proof. The administration sued on October 15 and asked the 9th Circuit to suspend the ballots. The majority called that request an invitation to contravene the clause by undermining its plain text. It said the requested action could also cancel ballots and remove voters from the rolls.

The ruling reinforced the state’s role during the election. It did not make non-citizen voting legal; the article says voting by non-citizens in federal elections is illegal in every state. Instead, it required the government to respect constitutional authority and avoid acting on an unverified list that could harm eligible voters.

Non-citizen voting in federal elections is illegal because federal elections are limited to eligible voters, while citizenship is a legal requirement described in the article. The article also says election fraud is extremely rare and that non-citizen voting is rare despite broader claims. It does not explain the legal penalties or a single national verification system.

In practice, safeguards generally include voter-registration applications, citizenship attestations, election-office database checks, list maintenance, and investigations of specific challenges. These systems are designed to identify ineligible registrations without automatically rejecting people based only on names or uncertain matches. The article gives a warning about that mechanism: some accused Californians shared names with eligible voters, and some said they never registered.

The California dispute shows why verification must be individual and accurate. Officials requested evidence that listed people were foreign nationals, but the article says none was provided. Safeguards should enforce the voting rule while protecting eligible voters from mistaken removal, especially immediately before an election.