With just a week left before Election Day, the Department of Justice has sued states, threatened election officials and arrested green card holders it suspects of voting illegally.
Those moves, part of a significant escalation of the Trump administration's campaign to intervene in the midterm elections, come during a time frame when the DOJ historically has refrained from acting in such ways. Politically sensitive investigations and prosecutions are usually paused in the weeks before Election Day so they don't influence how people vote, though no official prohibition exists.
President Donald Trump and his administration have sought to make concerns about illegal voting and voter registration a central issue in the election. Numerous studies by
election officials have shown voter fraud by noncitizens is extremely rare. There is no evidence that noncitizen voting has ever been significant enough to impact an election’s outcome, according to a 2026 Bipartisan Policy Center report. States routinely review the accuracy of their voter rolls. And sporadic cases of noncitizens voting are investigated and prosecuted.
Election experts, lawyers and advocacy groups have told USA TODAY they are worried that the Trump administration's latest moves are attempts to cast doubt on the trustworthiness of American elections and to intimidate certain people from turning out at the polls, including Hispanic voters.
"This whole narrative is an attack on Latino voters," Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar said.
Norm Eisen, Democracy Defenders Action's co-founder, also criticized the Trump administration's moves, pointing out that they could have been carried out earlier in his term.
"He's staring down a huge loss, so he's resorting to intimidation and even lies to engineer the results in Republicans' favor," said Eisen, who has been involved in many election-related suits against the Trump administration.
The White House referred USA TODAY to the DOJ for comment.
DOJ spokesperson Kiersten Pels said her agency is "moving with urgency, but prosecutors charge cases based on evidence, not on critics’ preferred timelines."
"Anyone who thinks they can charge these cases faster is welcome to apply," she said.
Trump announced during a prime-time White House speech in July that a “stunning investigation" by the Department of Homeland Security found 278,000 noncitizens registered to vote in federal elections. The department has since backed down from that number. And state investigations into the provided lists of names have consistently found they are either citizens or were misidentified.
A day after Trump's speech, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin announced that officials in states refusing to use a federal database to check their voter lists could face fines or prison time if his agency uncovers that noncitizens cast ballots.
This month, the DOJ sued California, alleging that the state probably has more than 20,000 noncitizens on its voter rolls. DOJ had given the state 48 hours to take steps for preventing alleged noncitizens in Los Angeles County from voting or face legal action. A federal judge has an initial hearing scheduled for the case Oct. 27.
Marc Elias, founder of the Elias Law Group, said he expects to see similar lawsuits against Nevada, New Jersey and Philadelphia. Elias is one of the most well-known election-related litigators pushing back on the administration.
"This is the tactic that they want to use," said Elias, whose law firm represents the Democratic Party. "What begins in California won't end in California."
U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche recently said the DOJ might launch similar lawsuits to block other states from counting ballots for the midterm election.
“There’s a number of states that we’re looking at,” Blanche told reporters in Virginia. “Whether we’re going to do something before the election, I don’t want to get too ahead of the civil lawyers working on those cases.”
On Oct. 26, the DOJ asked the Washington secretary of state to review a list of more than 400 people the federal agency believes are noncitizens and to sequester any ballots they cast. Both Washington and California are led by Democrats and mail ballots to every voter. Ballots can be returned by mail, at polling locations or at a drop box.
Those actions came after DOJ lost 27 lawsuits attempting to compel states to turn over detailed voter information.
"This DOJ lawsuit against the election officials in California is going to be instructive to see if that turns into a playbook for other states" that fought the lawsuits, said David Janovsky, acting director of the Constitution Project at the Project on Government Oversight, a nonpartisan watchdog group. "It could be a fairly disruptive development as states are trying to count ballots in a timely fashion."
In the past week, DOJ has announced that it has charged more than 75 people in California, Florida, Nevada, New York and Pennsylvania with crimes related to voting illegally, or with providing inaccurate information when registering to vote or applying for citizenship.
Recently, a federal judge also ruled that U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials' practice of knocking on doors and asking people about their immigration status – and whether they have voted in recent elections – likely violates the Voting Rights Act. U.S. District Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin ordered an end to "elections-related field operations and field interviews" in nine states, including California and New York.
In July, the head of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division sent letters to election officials in all 50 states, threatening criminal action if they knowingly allow noncitizens to vote or to remain on their voter rolls.
The DOJ followed up on its California lawsuit by warning local election officials through letters that those who refuse to help identify suspected noncitizens on voter rolls would "risk significant federal scrutiny."
Aguilar, the Nevada secretary of state, told USA TODAY his office is complying with seven DOJ subpoenas. Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson, who serves as the state’s chief election officer, has said she was told by DOJ she is under investigation over her refusal to hand over unredacted statewide voter registration records.
On Oct. 22, the DOJ filed a lawsuit in Alaska seeking to block certification of the state's U.S. Senate results if Republicans lose, based on confusion about the incumbent’s name. Sen. Dan S. Sullivan, R-Alaska, is defending his seat against former U.S. Rep. Mary Peltola, a Democrat. Sullivan has trailed the challenger with another candidate in the race, retired schoolteacher Daniel J. Sullivan. The Alaska Supreme Court approved keeping Daniel J. Sullivan's name on the ballot. The sitting senator is identified as the incumbent on the ballot.
The seat is among those Republicans need to hold to maintain control of the Senate.
Trump told reporters Oct. 23 that he directed the DOJ to file the lawsuit.
“I’m the one that said, 'Do it,'” Trump said.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump administration ramps up election cases days before voting ends
