9th Circuit Rejects DOJ Bid to Set Aside 20,000 California Ballots
Updated
Updated · POLITICO · Oct 29
9th Circuit Rejects DOJ Bid to Set Aside 20,000 California Ballots
3 articles · Updated · POLITICO · Oct 29
Summary
A 2-1 9th Circuit panel denied the Trump administration’s emergency push to make California separate mail-in ballots tied to 20,000 purported noncitizens.
The majority said the Justice Department bypassed the district judge, who had already set a Tuesday hearing, and then waited too long to justify emergency appellate relief.
Judges Gabriel Sanchez and Mark Bennett backed the denial, writing that the claimed emergency was partly “self-constructed”; Judge Patrick Bumatay dissented and would have granted the request.
The ruling leaves the dispute with the lower court for now and blocks the administration’s late-breaking attempt to alter California’s ballot handling before that hearing.