President Donald Trump has long alleged that the Democratic Party has allowed immigration in droves to garner votes. And he has been fixated on non-U.S. citizens voting in elections.
Now, some of that is playing out locally in Orange County.
Federal prosecutors have filed a lawsuit against Bob Page, Orange County’s registrar of voters, alleging he failed to provide unredacted voting records of non-U.S. citizens. The registrar’s office says it has removed 17 people from its voter rolls since 2020 either because the person self-reported being a noncitizen or because the Orange County district attorney’s office determined the person was ineligible to vote.
The federal government is seeking all of the information in those records, including sensitive data like driver’s license and Social Security numbers.
“Voting by noncitizens is a federal crime, and states and counties that refuse to disclose all requested voter information are in violation of well-established federal elections laws,” Harmeet K. Dhillon, assistant attorney general with the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said in a statement.
Records provided to LAist show the registrar’s willingness to share the records as long as sensitive information is kept private. Some say the federal government is trying to make an example out of Orange County and that the lawsuit is an overreach.
“The lawsuit is an unnecessary escalation that misrepresents what actually happened,” state Assemblymember Avelino Valencia wrote in a statement.
What we know from the lawsuit
Prosecutors said they had received a complaint from a non-U.S. citizen alleging they received a mail-in ballot from the O.C. registrar of voters. Federal and state law prohibit non-U.S. citizens from voting in state or federal elections.
The Department of Justice asked the registrar for records regarding voters whose registration was canceled because they didn’t meet the citizenship requirement.
Page turned over the records, but redacted some information citing state privacy and voting laws. The redacted data included driver’s license and Social Security numbers, language preference, and images of the registrants’ signatures. Federal prosecutors argued that information should be publicly disclosed. They then filed a lawsuit against Page alleging he was violating federal voting law by not turning over all of the information unredacted.
“Removal of noncitizens from the state’s voter rolls is critical to ensuring that the state’s voter rolls are accurate and that elections in California are conducted without fraudulent voting,” Dhillon said in a statement accompanying the lawsuit.
Records show the registrar was willing to share data confidentially
A spokesperson for the registrar’s office told LAist that Page can’t comment on ongoing litigation. But the county provided LAist with emails between the county and the Department of Justice showing the county sought to comply with the voter information request while ensuring registration information would be kept confidential.
“To avoid a lawsuit, would the USDOJ consider another mechanism to enable the county to provide the USDOJ with this sensitive information?” James D. P. Steinmann, the county’s deputy counsel, wrote on Tuesday to Maureen Riordan, acting chief of the DOJ’s voting section. The county’s top lawyer, Leon Page, said Riordan never responded. Instead, the government filed its lawsuit the following day.
Leon Page said the registrar already has an agreement to confidentially share data regarding alleged voting fraud with the county district attorney and would be willing to do the same with the DOJ.
“Now that a lawsuit has been filed, we hope to explore the resolution of this litigation with the production of unredacted voter registration records to the USDOJ pursuant to a stipulated protective order,” Page wrote in an email to LAist.
Not the first time for clashes over voting in Orange County
One of the DOJ lawyers listed on the case is former Huntington Beach City Attorney Michael Gates, who has repeatedly clashed with state and local election authorities in recent years over the city’s efforts to implement its own voter ID requirements. Voters approved the measure in 2024, but the state has sued, alleging it violates California law.
The county registrar’s office is bound by state election code, which calls for requiring voters to prove their identity when they register to vote (though not necessarily with a government-issued ID), but not at polling places. That could force Huntington Beach to run its own, stand-alone city elections, at a much greater cost than it currently pays the registrar to consolidate city races on the ballot with state and federal races.
Bob Page, the registrar, also recently found himself at odds with the Orange County Republican Party. In April, the registrar’s office issued a news release stating that the SAVE Act, which would require voters to show proof of citizenship to register, would cost the office an additional $6 million annually. “Will Congress appropriate the funds local and state elections officials need to implement the SAVE Act?” the news release asks.
In response, the O.C. Republican Party issued a statement condemning what they said was a “partisan attack” on the voter ID law, which the House of Representatives passed in April.
“Page has crossed a dangerous line by both amplifying a false and misleading partisan position and publicly criticizing a Republican-led proposal designed to strengthen election integrity,” the party said.
Orange County officials weigh in
Orange County officials have weighed in on either side of the voter data dispute along party lines.
O.C. Supervisor Don Wagner, a Republican, said Bob Page has “forced the hand of the Department of Justice” to file the lawsuit because the county did not comply with the federal request.
“By placing roadblocks and refusing to comply, instead arguing that we are following state law, we invited this lawsuit,” Wagner said in a statement. “It is up to affected voters to seek injunctive relief. This is not our fight. The county’s only interest is in having the cleanest possible voter rolls so that every eligible voter may vote, but only eligible voters may vote.”
O.C. Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento, a Democrat, called the lawsuit an “unnecessary intimidation tactic.”
“I fully support Registrar Page and his consistent commitment to fair, secure elections. The registrar has reasonably offered to work with the Department of Justice, but instead they chose the costly path of litigation,” Sarmiento said in a statement.
Meanwhile, O.C. Supervisor Katrina Foley said voter fraud in the county was a minuscule issue, noting that the registrar’s office had found 17 instances where voters did not meet the citizenship requirement out of 1.9 million registered voters countywide. She said only one was referred to the district attorney’s office for prosecution.
“Our registrar of voters office moved swiftly to cancel the registration of all other ineligible voters. Our system is working,” she said. “Voter privacy is built into the system and state law prohibits the county from providing private information without a court order. The County of Orange takes very seriously our duty to protect the private personal information of the people who register to vote in our county.”
