A citizen of the Philippines who registered and voted in Philadelphia's 2020 general election has pleaded guilty in federal court to voting by an alien, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania announced — a case that turns on a single ballot cast six years ago and a single “Yes” answer on an online registration form.
Source: U.S. Attorney's Office, Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Nov. 2026
The plea
Emily Custodio, 52, entered her guilty plea before U.S. District Judge Joel H. Slomsky in Philadelphia to the federal charge of voting by an alien, U.S. Attorney David Metcalf announced. Under both federal and Pennsylvania law, only U.S. citizens may vote in Pennsylvania, the office noted. Custodio was charged by indictment in September 2025; the plea resolves the case without a trial.
How prosecutors say the vote happened
On July 18, 2020, Custodio applied online to the Pennsylvania Department of State to register to vote, falsely answering “Yes” to the question asking whether she was a United States citizen, according to court filings and statements detailed by prosecutors. Three days later, on July 21, 2020, her application was accepted on the strength of that information, and she was registered to vote in Pennsylvania.
On November 3, 2020, she appeared in person at her assigned polling place in Philadelphia County and cast a vote in the 2020 general election, prosecutors said. She signed her name in the poll book beside the statement “I hereby certify that I am qualified to vote at this election…” and voted in an election that included the races for President and Vice President of the United States.
Custodio is of Clementon, New Jersey, according to the indictment — a reminder that the registration and the ballot at issue were in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which is why the case was prosecuted in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
From indictment to plea
When she was indicted in September 2025, Custodio faced two counts — one of voter fraud and one of voting by an alien — and a combined maximum of six years in prison, three years of supervised release and a $350,000 fine, the U.S. Attorney's Office said at the time. By pleading guilty to the voting-by-an-alien count, she now faces a maximum of one year in prison, one year of supervised release and a $100,000 fine when Judge Slomsky sentences her on February 16.
Source: U.S. Attorney's Office — Philippine Citizen Charged With Election Fraud Offenses, Sept. 2025
The case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations and the FBI, and was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Nancy Potts and Mark Dubnoff, according to the indictment announcement.
Citizenship — not residence, not a green card, and not being handed a registration card — is what makes a person eligible to vote in federal and Pennsylvania elections. Registering while ineligible is itself a federal crime, even for a single ballot, and a conviction can carry immigration consequences beyond the sentence the court imposes.
A pattern of individual prosecutions in the same district
Custodio's plea is the second of its kind announced by the same U.S. Attorney's Office in recent weeks. In September, Evelyn Miller, 37, of Emmaus, Pennsylvania — also a Philippine citizen, lawfully residing in the United States as a permanent resident — pleaded guilty to illegally voting in the 2024 general election, after registering online on October 9, 2024, and voting in person that November. Miller is scheduled to be sentenced on December 16 and faces the same maximum: one year in prison, one year of supervised release and a $100,000 fine.
For the large Punjabi and wider immigrant communities of Pennsylvania and neighbouring New Jersey — where many residents are green-card holders years away from naturalization — the two cases carry a practical lesson officials repeat after every election: a registration form arriving in the mail, or a clerk offering one, does not make a non-citizen eligible, and the citizenship question on the form must be answered truthfully.
What happens next
Custodio remains to be sentenced on February 16, when Judge Slomsky will decide a term within the one-year statutory maximum, along with supervised release and any fine. Prosecutors have not announced any separate immigration action in her case; the guilty plea itself is final, and the 2020 ballot she cast cannot be withdrawn.