Justice Department charges more than 2 dozen in California sweep targeting alleged noncitizen voters

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Federal authorities charged more than two dozen foreign nationals Monday in California as part of a statewide sweep targeting people who officials say have illegally registered or voted in U.S. elections.

The arrests are part of a Trump administration effort to root out noncitizen voting ahead of next month's midterm elections, even though data shows that the problem is incredibly rare, difficult to prove and has not been shown to change the outcome of races.

Federal officials on Monday blamed California officials for the alleged crimes, accusing them of facilitating noncitizen voting through inadequate voter roll maintenance and hiding it from the public. The charges escalated a simmering voter roll fight that came into focus last week when the Justice Department sued California officials and warned that local election workers who knowingly process or tabulate ballots submitted by noncitizen voters are at risk of investigation and potential prosecution.

The Justice Department said the 28 people who were charged as part of a sweep dubbed Operation Protect the Vote are lawful permanent residents — but not U.S. citizens who are permitted to legally vote. They are charged with crimes including making false statements on a naturalization application and submitting fraudulent voter registrations.

“This causes real damage to real elections and real damage to American citizens," Trent McCotter, the acting deputy attorney general at the Justice Department, said during a news conference in Los Angeles.

Rob Bonta, California's Democratic attorney general, said Monday that there is no widespread voter fraud in California and that while “one-off” examples of voter fraud are possible, those instances are “a drop in the bucket” considering the state has 23 million registered voters.

Bonta said he expects his state to prevail in the federal government's lawsuit, saying the Republican administration “has provided us with no facts of any ineligible voters, just a conclusory statement with no evidence to back it.”

The federal government has made noncitizen voting a priority this year, demanding detailed voter information — including dates of birth, addresses, driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers — from the states. While some states voluntarily handed over the information, the department sued 30 states and the District of Columbia to obtain it — lawsuits that so far have been unsuccessful.

The Justice Department said Monday it has charged 113 people in 20 states with illegal voting and illegal registration offenses over the last several weeks, It earlier said it had charged about 90 people for various types of election misconduct so far this year, including 50 who are alleged to have voted as noncitizens. There were more than 227 million registered voters in the United States during the 2024 presidential election.

The operation Monday involved the four U.S. attorneys' offices across California in what the Justice Department intended as a statewide show of force.

Among the dozens of people arrested was a 72-year-old Belize-born man who is accused of voting illegally in four elections.

Dozens of federal agents descended on the man's residential cul-de-sac in Commerce, a small city in Los Angeles County, to make the arrest. The man was put in handcuffs in his pajamas and taken into federal custody downtown. Others emerged from the house to watch and questioned the number of heavily armed officers present for the arrest, as well as the need for handcuffs.

The arrests were the latest in a flurry of activity that has unfolded in heavily Democratic California, which is not typically regarded as a key battleground state but does have a handful of competitive congressional races that could help determine which party controls the U.S. House for the final two years of President Donald Trump’s term.

The administration last week sued California to prevent it from counting mail ballots from people the federal government has identified as “likely” noncitizens until their immigration status can be confirmed.

The complaint was filed after California officials were given, and did not meet, a 48-hour deadline to review a password-protected thumb drive that contained a list of 20,000 names. The federal government says those are likely noncitizens who were sent ballots to participate in the Nov. 3 election, although the secretary of state said the administration has provided no evidence to support that claim. The state mails ballots to all registered voters.

McCotter said the 20,000 number was likely to rise.

“That’s just the floor,” he said.

He said the lawsuit against California was necessary because “state-facilitated voter fraud is unacceptable,” and accused state officials of creating the last-minute emergency before Election Day by not working with Justice Department officials sooner to check alleged noncitizen voters.

Explaining why it was important to address voting by noncitizens even thought it's rare, he noted that some races in California have been decided by just hundreds of votes.

Bill Essayli, the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, criticized the state's election officials for not cooperating with the department's demands.

“Why is California refusing to show their voter rolls?” he asked. “What are they afraid of? What are they hiding?”

As part of its lawsuit, the Justice Department filed paperwork Monday seeking a court order that would force California to set aside ballots from suspected noncitizens and to independently, or in conjunction with the federal government, verify their citizenship status before tabulating their mail-in ballot. The Justice Department asked for the order to be entered in time for the Nov. 3 election.

Absent that order, the government said, “there is a significant risk that American votes will be diluted.”

Requests for comment sent Monday to the secretary of state and governor's office were not immediately returned.

On Friday, the Justice Department followed up with a letter warning that state election officials who knowingly process ballots cast by noncitizen voters are at risk of investigation.

“The legal consequences for either facilitating or ignoring a federal crime are significant. Noncitizen voting in a federal election is a federal crime — and knowingly facilitating such conduct is equally unlawful,” warns the letter from McCotter.

It adds: “If persons knowingly tabulate ballots cast by individuals identified by federal agencies as noncitizens, they risk becoming aiders and abettors to a federal crime.”

The letter is addressed to the Los Angeles County Counsel’s office and also is copied to California Secretary of State Shirley Weber and Los Angeles County Registrar Dean Logan, effectively putting the entire state on notice.

In response to the letter, Logan said his office is focused on conducting a fair and secure election while noting that Election Day is a mere 18 days away.

“The U.S. Department of Justice has chosen to litigate their unverified assertions of voting eligibility. At this point, it is best for this to be addressed in court,” he said.

Associated Press writers Eric Tucker in Washington and Ali Swenson in New York contributed to this report.

Acting U.S. Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter stands next to a display showing photos of people charged with illegally registering to vote during a news conference in Los Angeles, Monday, Oct. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

A Homeland Security Investigations task force officer stands near police tape marking a perimeter during a federal operation targeting suspected illegal voter registration in Commerce, Calif., Monday, Oct. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Homeland Security Investigations task force officers escort a suspect accused of illegally registering to vote to a processing facility at Federal Building in Los Angeles, Monday, Oct. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Homeland Security Investigations task force officers arrest a suspect accused of illegally registering to vote during a federal operation in Commerce, Calif., Monday, Oct. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Homeland Security Investigations task force officers escort a suspect accused of illegally registering to vote during a federal operation in Commerce, Calif., Monday, Oct. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

FILE - Ballots are sorted the day after California's primary election at the LA County Ballot Processing Center, June 3, 2026, in City of Industry, Calif. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File)

CAIRO (AP) — Iran-backed Houthi rebels struck Yemeni government forces with ballistic missiles on Monday, killing at least 53 soldiers at a military camp in one of the deadliest attacks since a resurgence in fighting this summer, Yemeni military officials said.

The attack wounded an additional 200 recruits at the military camp in the southern province of Shabwa, the provincial government there said. The rebels acknowledged targeting the camp.

The fighting between the Houthis and Yemen’s Saudi-backed government forces is a widening front in the Iran war that began in February. The escalation shattered a 2022 ceasefire deal that largely stopped fighting in Yemen’s civil war.

The Houthis have put their growing military capabilities on display on multiple fronts in recent weeks, repeatedly striking Saudi Arabia’s main international airport hundreds of miles (kilometers) away and seizing territory inside Yemen near a key shipping chokepoint.

In a sign that the Houthi attacks are unsettling Saudi society, the kingdom on Monday canceled a global investment conference scheduled for next week and extended an order for schools in and around Riyadh, the capital, to teach students remotely.

Iran and its allies in Lebanon and Iraq provide expertise, training and sophisticated weapons to the Houthis, according to U.N. and other experts. Iran denies arming the Houthis, which would violate a U.N. embargo.

The provincial government in Shabwa said the death toll from Monday's attack could rise. “This bloody, treacherous attack targeted new recruits in the training and preparation phase and is considered an extremely critical military escalation and a blatant aggression on the security and stability of Shabwa province,” the statement said.

It called on Yemen’s president, the Saudi-led coalition and the government to expedite air defense and early warning systems to reinforce Shabwa’s capabilities.

The head of Yemen's ruling Presidential Leadership Council, Rashad al-Alimi, promised a “firm response” and said the attack reflects the Houthis’ "approach of resorting to cowardly terrorist attacks whenever they face pressures or their Iranian-backed sabotage plots falter.”

A Houthi military spokesman claimed the camp was targeted because it is operated by Saudi officers, and that some of them were killed in the attack — though he provided no evidence. The Saudi government did not immediately comment.

On Sunday, the Houthi-run Health Ministry blamed Saudi-led forces for an airstrike that killed at least nine people in Yemen’s rebel-held northern province of Saada. Five children and two women were killed in the attack, one of several that killed or wounded more than 30 people over the weekend, according to the rebels.

There was no immediate comment from Saudi Arabia.

The Houthis, a Shiite religious and political movement rooted in northern Yemen, are increasingly attacking Saudi Arabia because it supports Yemen’s internationally recognized government in the civil war.

The Sunni kingdom, which has long feared the emergence of a well-armed ally of Shiite Iran on its border, joined the war in 2015 after the rebels seized much of northern Yemen, including the capital, Sana’a.

In recent weeks, the Houthis have targeted Saudi airports, oil and military facilities, and the headquarters of Saudi oil giant Aramco.

On Monday, Houthi rebels claimed to have carried out six attacks targeting oil infrastructure, airports and military sites across Saudi Arabia, but the group did not specify when the attacks took place.

The Saudi Civil Defense issued danger alerts but no immediate reports of casualties or damage.

In Yemen, the Houthis recently seized more territory along the Red Sea coast and near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a crucial shipping alternative to the Strait of Hormuz. The Saudi-led coalition launched a major military offensive earlier this month to dislodge the rebels from that strategic perch and retake the territory.

Monday marked five years since Houthis detained more than 20 Yemeni staff of the U.S. embassy in Sana’a. The embassy had suspended operations in 2015 but local staff still provided security and basic maintenance of the facility. The State Department on Monday called for their “immediate and unconditional release.”

Associated Press writers Ahmed al-Haj in Aden, Yemen, and Baraa Anwer in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, contributed to this report.

People ride in a pickup truck during a funeral procession for a Houthi officer in Sanaa, Yemen, Saturday, Oct. 17, 2026. The Arabic banner reads, "Martyr Mazen Abdallah." (AP Photo/Osamah Abdulrahman)