Immigrants seeking US citizenship targeted in Trump administration's illegal voting crackdown

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Most of the immigrants targeted by federal authorities in California this week for alleged voter fraud had applied for U.S. citizenship and now face charges related to lying on forms or during interviews. Those charges could lead to years in prison and thwart their efforts to naturalize.

One of them is José Antonio Bañuelos-Díaz, 42, who applied for citizenship in October 2025 after living in the country for 40 years and spending his entire adult life as a legal permanent resident. The federal government has alleged in charging documents that he improperly claimed to be a citizen in 2007 when registering to vote, then later lied about it on his immigration paperwork. The government hasn't accused him of casting a ballot.

Bañuelos-Díaz told The Associated Press he had no idea he had registered to vote until he was arrested Monday outside his Los Angeles home, though he recalls getting a driver's license around 2007. In California, people are prompted to register to vote when applying for a driver’s license.

“I have never voted because I know I can’t vote,” he said. “If there was a mistake, they should have called me out right away, not 20 years later.”

He was released from custody after his arrest but faces up to five years in prison if convicted.

Federal authorities on Monday charged more than two dozen legal permanent residents in California in a crackdown on people accused of illegally voting or registering to do so. As of Thursday morning, the government had filed charging documents in 10 of the 28 cases, offering additional details about how authorities relied on voter registration data to pursue broader criminal charges around immigration status.

Most of the immigrants charged in California have lived in the country for at least five years, and some of them for decades. They could face deportation if they lied on their citizenship application.

Immigrants convicted of illegally voting in the United States face up to a year in prison. Those convicted of lying on applications to become American citizens face up to a decade.

The Justice Department said in a statement that six people would be charged with voting as a noncitizen, a misdemeanor. The 22 others were facing a combination of felony charges including lying on their naturalization application during interviews or on voter registration forms.

In one case, Homeland Security agents arrested Pamele Arbues Line immediately following her Oct. 15 naturalization interview in San Diego.

In charging documents, the federal government said Line had allegedly registered to vote five times and had submitted ballots in several elections but said in her paperwork and in the interview that she had never voted or claimed to be a U.S. citizen. She later admitted to registering to vote while getting her driver’s license renewed last year and said she voted once, according to the charging documents.

Line, who is from the Philippines, told authorities she thought she was a U.S. citizen because her mother had become naturalized after they moved to the United States more than four decades ago. But Line, now 56, was 19 at the time and not covered by her mother's citizenship, according to the government. She learned she was not a citizen in June when she went to get a renewed Social Security card, and she told agents she applied for naturalization the same day, according to the documents.

She faces at least 10 years in prison if convicted of two charges.

The cases are part of a Trump administration effort to root out noncitizen voting ahead of the 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.

The Department of Justice has sued California for not complying with a request to verify the citizenship of roughly 20,000 registered voters it says may be noncitizens. California, which has more than 23 million registered voters, has argued the state complies with federal law and that the Trump administration's numbers are likely significantly inflated.

State election officials also noted once a ballot is mailed in, it is separated from any individual voter identification, making it impossible to separate based on the information provided by the federal government.

Beyond voting, the Trump administration has also ramped up immigration enforcement nationwide and slowed down the approval of naturalization applications. Government data shows officials approved 58,000 naturalization applications between April and June 2026, less than a quarter of the number approved in the same period in 2025, according to the data.

Immigrants can apply to become U.S. citizens after holding green cards for at least three years. They must answer extensive questions about activities related to voting, political activities and crime, pass background checks and a civics test and meet English language requirements.

The Department of Homeland Security did not say what initially drew attention to the immigrants charged but said in an email that the agency reviewed naturalization and other records in its investigation. Some of the court documents in the cases describe a benefits fraud audit performed by Homeland Security in August that started the process of identifying those charged this week.

“The voting rights of American citizens must be protected,” First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said in a statement announcing the charges this week.

Amandeep Kaur, who is among those charged, has lived in the country for eight years and is in the process of becoming a naturalized U.S. citizen, said her husband, Kulwinder Singh.

Singh said she got her driver's license in 2024 but took the written test at the DMV in Hindi because she struggles with English. He doesn’t know if she registered to vote then. He said she received and returned a ballot in 2024 but they both thought it was a registration form.

Now, he said his wife is distraught with the news that she may have done something illegal.

“All she does is cry. It’s heartbreaking,” said Singh, who is a U.S. citizen.

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Lauer contributed from Philadelphia and Taxin from Santa Ana, Calif.

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)

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)

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)

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

Asian shares were mostly lower Friday after the latest shudder for artificial-intelligence stocks weighed on markets around the world, giving the benchmark S&P 500 its worst day since July.

Oil prices were hovering at their highest levels since May on worries about the war with Iran, with Brent crude up 0.5% at $113.73 per barrel. U.S. benchmark crude oil added 0.6% to $100.08 per barrel.

In share trading, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 lost 1.7% to 61,825.26, while the Kospi in South Korea declined 2.4% to 5,403.32.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng climbed 0.2% to 22,983.80 and the Shanghai Composite index slipped 1.3% to 3,610.52.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 shed 0.2% to 8,777.00.

On Thursday, the S&P 500 fell 1.2%, while the Nasdaq composite tumbled 2.6%. The weakness for tech stocks was so overwhelming that it masked strength for the rest of the U.S. market, where the majority of stocks actually rose. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added less than 0.1%.

AI-related stocks have been swinging on worries that their boom may be under threat because of how expensive it’s become to borrow money to build data centers and buy more AI chips. Investors fear their prices shot too high during a yearslong frenzy, even though companies in the industry continue to report growth.

Meta Platforms, which is pushing its Muse AI agent, lost 7% after reporting stronger revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected, though its profit fell short. The company behind Facebook and Instagram also said it’s creating a new class of stock to raise money to pay for AI investments and other expenses.

Tesla fell 3.1% after reporting a stronger profit for the summer than analysts expected, though its revenue was weaker than forecast.

The global tide against AI stocks knocked Nvidia down 4.4%. Because the chip giant is the largest company on Wall Street by total value, movements for its stock carry more weight on the S&P 500 than any other, and it was the single strongest force pulling the index lower.

CoreWeave, which has borrowed money to buy Nvidia’s AI chips that it rents out to customers over the cloud, has been particularly shaky in recent weeks because of worries about its debt. It dropped 10.1%.

Higher oil prices also have been weighing on stocks. The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil leaped 4% on Thursday and has shot up from less than $97 at the start of the month on uncertainty about when the war with Iran will allow the global energy industry to return to normal.

Worries about big government debt loads and strained budgets are hanging over almost every developed economy. Protests across France have raised pressure on the government to increase spending, which could add further to its debt.

In the United States, such concerns, along with high inflation, signals of a still-strong U.S. economy and other factors, have pushed yields in the U.S. bond market recently to their highest levels in decades.

But U.S. yields fell sharply Thursday in a signal that investors were buying U.S. government bonds in search of something safer to own as AI stocks tumbled.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury tumbled to 4.97% from 5.13% late Wednesday and from more than 5.30% earlier this month. That’s a major move for the bond market.

Thursday’s drop in yields came even as another report suggested the U.S. economy may be doing better than economists expected. It said fewer U.S. workers applied for unemployment benefits last week, which could signal that layoffs remain low across the country.

In other dealings early Friday, the U.S. dollar rose to 156.93 Japanese yen from 156.77 yen. The euro was unchanged at $1.1215.

AP Business Writer Stan Choe in New York contributed to this report.

A screen shows the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics Co. stock price at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders watch monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Oct. 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)