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Imagine running an election where the federal government hands you 20,000 names, every one of them individually reviewed by a federal employee at Citizenship and Immigration Services and Homeland Security Investigations and confirmed as not a U.S. citizen, every one of them mailed a live ballot this month, and your answer is no thanks… we would rather count them. That is California right now. First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli says 20,000 is "the floor," and a DHS letter back in July flagged nearly 200,000 California voters as possible noncitizens. All he is asking is that the state set those ballots aside until citizenship is checked. He isn't asking them to throw a single one out or arrest anybody at the mailbox, just put them in a pile and verify. And Rob Bonta's office answered by moving to dismiss the whole case, claiming the DOJ "lacks standing." Standing? Whose vote do you think gets canceled out when a noncitizen's ballot gets counted? Here is the part that should make your blood boil. California's own officials admit in court that once a signature is verified, the ballot comes out of the envelope and goes into the pile with everyone else's, and after that nobody can ever trace it back. LA County alone has already processed 331,000 ballots. So every day they stall is another day those ballots disappear into the count for good… and they know it. Essayli said it plainly, "the crime is occurring in real time." Now keep in mind the state could end this fast. Hand over driver's license numbers and Social Security numbers where they have them, let the feds run them through the databases, and sort out who is a citizen and who isn't. California refuses, and then turns around and calls the federal list unreliable. How exactly do you call a list unreliable when you refuse to give anyone the records to check it? I honestly don't know how anyone defends this with a straight face. They tell you there is nothing to see while making sure nobody is allowed to look… make no mistake, refusing to verify is a choice, and so is counting. DOJ asked the judge for a ruling by noon today. [@AGRobBonta](https://x.com/AGRobBonta), set the 20,000 ballots aside and prove us wrong. Thank you for your attention to this matter.