Federal authorities sued Orange County’s top election officials Wednesday, accusing the county registrant of violating federal law and refusing to disclose the people evacuated by voters Rolls-Royce because they are not citizens.
The lawsuit filed in federal court claims that Orange County registrar Bob Page “hidden illegal registration of unqualified, non-citizen voters” by withholding sensitive personal information such as Social Security and driver’s license numbers.
The 10-page lawsuit does not claim any non-citizens to vote in Orange County.
“Non-citizen voting is a federal crime,” said Harmeet Dhillon, assistant attorney general of the Department of Civil Rights Division. “States and counties that refuse to disclose all required voter information violated recognized federal election laws.”
The lawsuit stems from a June 2 letter from the Justice Department to Orange County election officials seeking information about people who have been evacuated from the county’s voter’s volume because they are not eligible to vote. According to the lawsuit, federal officials are complaining about relatives of non-citizens who received mail votes.
Page told federal agencies in a letter dated June 16 that within five years, Orange County has identified 17 non-citizens who have registered to vote. Page said the people either “self-reported” that they are not citizens or were deemed ineligible by the Orange County District Attorney’s Office.
According to a letter from the county attorney, the registrar sent the names, dates of birth and addresses of 17 people to federal officials, but ruled on a letter from the county attorney that ruled some sensitive information, including a Social Security number, driver number, voter identification number and signature.
County lawyers believe that withholding more sensitive personal information strikes a balance between federal disclosure laws and state laws to limit how election officials share private information.
Leon Page, county counsel for Orange County, which has nothing to do with Bob Page, said in an email that federal officials did not generate subpoenas or identify “substantial legal authority” to illustrate why the Registrar’s office should disclose sensitive personal information protected by state law.
He said the county lawyers also proposed to draft a “disclosure agreement that would limit restrictions to government purposes,” but he said the Justice Department did not respond to the proposal.
“Instead, USDOJ filed a lawsuit,” Leon Page said, who said the county hopes to resolve the complaint through a court protection order. Such an order could revolve around how the Department of Justice uses or shares information about non-citizens who register to vote.
Justin Levitt, an election law expert at Loyola Marymount University School of Law, a former voting lawyer for the Justice Department, said the lawsuit was “somewhat weird” in part because government agencies often negotiated about shared information and rarely went to court.
He said the Justice Department should be able to verify that Orange County has a process that ensures that the unqualified person is turned away by seeing the full name, address and birthday of the person who was deleted.
He said there was no need for a Social Security number or driver’s license number, raising questions about how the Justice Department plans to use the information it requires.
Levitt said federal law requires election officials to maintain voter information within 22 months of the election. Many officials keep these records longer, but no law requires them to do so. He said he did not know “what the Fed has” and required voter information to date back to 2020.
“It’s a pretty small dispute, with a small bet, on very few records,” Levitt said. “But that’s another point in a series of unsettling points in the government’s data practice.”
Orange County Supervisor Don Wagner, one of two Republicans of five, said in a prepared statement that “unnecessarily, the Justice Department’s hands were unnecessarily forced to “place obstacles and refuse to comply.”
“We invited this lawsuit,” Wagner said. “The county’s only interest is to have the cleanest voter roll so that every qualified voter can vote, but only qualified voters can vote.”
Democratic director Katrina Foley defended the county’s decision to edit some information, saying the county “has very seriously protected the private personal information of the people who voted in our county.”
“Voter privacy is built into the system, and state law prohibits the county from providing private information without a court order,” Furley said. If the Justice Department has signed a court order, the county will provide the requested information.
Californians must verify their identity when registering for a vote, and the information is cross-referenced with the Department of Motor Vehicle Archives. The state also imposed penalties on fraudulent registrations.
Bob Page said in a Reddit Q&A with the Orange County Register last year that state law prohibits the registry office from verifying a person’s citizenship when he votes at the time of registration, beyond the state’s verification.
He said his office updates voter registration documents daily and makes about 60,000 changes per month. The Registrar said his office would contact the Orange County District Attorney or the California Secretary of State if there is evidence that someone illegally registered to vote.
An Orange County spokesman said 16 of the 17 people who registered to vote and were not eligible for five years reported themselves that they were not citizens.
The District Attorney’s Office found that although he was not a citizen, a person registered to vote. The person is a Canadian citizen and legal resident and pleaded guilty in 2024, counting three misdemeanors in the 2016 primary and general elections. He was sentenced to one year’s informal probation.
Bob Page did not return any news about the litigation comments. A spokesman for the Registered Office said the county does not comment on trial or ongoing litigation.
Last year, voters in Santa Ana rejected a measure that would allow non-citizens to vote in local competitions. The measure will allow residents of the city (even if not citizens) to vote for local measures, but they are still not eligible to vote in federal and state elections.
San Francisco allows parents of school children to vote in school board competitions, even if they are not citizens. Voters in Auckland approved similar measures in 2022, but have not yet implemented them.
Some cities in Maryland and Vermont also allow non-citizens to vote in local elections, but these measures have faced legal challenges.
A New York City law that could have allowed a non-referendum was removed from the state’s top courts in March, finding it violated the state’s constitution.
