OLYMPIA, Washington — The U.S. Department of Justice has asked Washington state to set aside and not count any mail ballots cast in next week's midterm elections by 405 registered voters whom federal prosecutors allege are not U.S. citizens, until each person's citizenship can be confirmed. The request, made in a letter dated Monday, October 26, to Secretary of State Steve Hobbs, is an allegation by the federal government, not a court finding: none of the 405 people has been charged with a crime, and Hobbs's office disputes the reliability of the federal list.
Source: Reuters via WTBX
Acting U.S. Attorney Charles Neil Floyd of the Western District of Washington, in Seattle, and the top federal prosecutor's office in Spokane, in the state's Eastern District, signed the demand, according to Reuters. At a news conference in Seattle on Monday, Floyd said the 405 people identified so far represented, in his words, 'the tip of the iceberg,' and that federal authorities had identified them by analysing publicly available lists of registered voters against immigration records.
Source: KNKX Public Radio
'Without our help, the state of Washington does not have the capacity or the will to check if noncitizens are voting,' Floyd said at the news conference, according to KNKX Public Radio. 'However, under the leadership of President Trump, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice are determined to root out illegal voting.' Floyd said the voters on the list had cast around 1,500 ballots in past state and federal elections. The Washington State Standard reported that many of the 405 are, according to the letter, lawful permanent residents, that some have allegedly voted for more than a decade, and that Floyd said he anticipates criminal charges will follow, although none has been filed yet.
Source: Washington State Standard via Issaquah Reporter
A noon Wednesday deadline, and a threat of emergency court action
The letter gives Washington until noon local time on Wednesday, October 28, to determine whether the more than 400 people are in fact U.S. citizens and to not count their ballots until that determination is made, Reuters reported. The Justice Department said it would seek 'emergency relief' in court if the state could not take those actions by the deadline. Washington sends a mail ballot to every registered voter, and voters must attest to their eligibility by signing a declaration on the ballot return envelope in every election.
Source: Reuters via WTBX
Hobbs pushes back: 'unfounded suspicion' one week before the election
Secretary of State Steve Hobbs, Washington's top elections official, said his office is carefully reviewing the request to ensure any response complies with state and federal law. 'The timing of this request — one week before the General Election — is no doubt intended to cast unfounded suspicion on the results,' Hobbs said in a statement reported by KNKX and the Washington State Standard. He said Washington's elections are secure and that cases of voter fraud, including noncitizen voting, are incredibly rare: just 15 cases of noncitizen voting in Washington between 1982 and 2025, by his count.
Source: KNKX Public Radio
Hobbs also warned that the system the Justice Department uses to identify alleged noncitizen voters frequently flags people who are in fact U.S. citizens, and raises privacy concerns. His office noted that the data provided by federal authorities included the last time each of the 405 people voted — and that in one case, the voter's last recorded ballot was in 1994, more than three decades ago. Hobbs said his office 'will only respond to requests that follow due process' and, referring to the parallel fight in California, that Washingtonians should not be harassed.
Source: Washington State Standard via Issaquah Reporter
The 405 names are a federal allegation based on a match between voter lists and immigration records. No court has found that these voters are noncitizens, no charges have been filed, and the Secretary of State says the matching system is known to flag genuine U.S. citizens by mistake. Awaaz Punjab is reporting both sides' claims as claims until a court or the state's own review settles them.
Background: the same fight is already running in California
The Washington letter follows a similar Justice Department request earlier this month that California not count mail ballots from around 20,000 people the administration alleges are noncitizens, Reuters reported. That dispute is already in court, and a federal appeals panel this week declined to rule on the expedited timeline and sent the matter back to a lower court. Legal experts and state officials quoted in national reporting note that multiple state audits and independent studies have found voting by noncitizens to be very rare and to have never affected an election outcome — a point Hobbs's 15-cases-in-43-years figure is meant to underline.
Source: Reuters via WTBX
Why this matters a week before November 3
The intervention lands seven days before the November 3 midterm elections, in which President Donald Trump's fellow Republicans are fighting to retain slim majorities in both chambers of Congress, Reuters reported. One of the roughly 10 House races that could decide control of the U.S. House of Representatives is in southwest Washington, where Democratic Representative Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is campaigning to hold her seat. For Washington's large immigrant communities — including Punjabi families around Seattle, Tacoma, Kent and the farming counties of eastern Washington — the practical message is narrow but important: if you are a naturalized citizen and registered, your ballot is lawful, and being named in a records match is not proof of anything. Voters who receive any official notice should respond through the Secretary of State's office or their county elections office, not through unsolicited callers.
Source: Reuters via WTBX
What happens next
All eyes are now on the noon Wednesday, October 28 deadline. If Hobbs's office does not confirm the actions the Justice Department demanded, federal lawyers have said they will seek emergency relief from a court, which would put a judge — days before election day — in charge of deciding whether 405 Washington ballots are held back from the count. The state's review of the list is continuing, and no decision by the state to comply or refuse had been reported by late Tuesday night. Awaaz Punjab will update this story when the state responds or a court rules.