An appeals court orders California to answer by noon Saturday in the fight over 20,000 ballots mailed to suspected noncitizens

The fight over California’s mail ballots reached the appeals court on a deadline. Late on Friday, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ordered California to respond by noon Saturday to the Justice Department’s emergency request in the case, after District Judge David Carter did not rule by the hour the department had demanded. The department wants California election officials to set aside the ballots tied to people on its list while their eligibility is reviewed, rather than let those ballots be processed and mixed with the rest.

The filing, submitted by Attorney General Todd Blanche and First Assistant United States Attorney Bill Essayli, covers more than 20,000 people registered to vote in California who received mail ballots and whom the department says are highly likely to be noncitizens. “This is an emergency,” the filing said. “Every minute of processing that occurs without segregating the ballots of suspected noneligible voters causes untraceable disenfranchisement and dilution of the votes of United States citizens.” Essayli told Fox News the department is asking for nothing drastic beyond holding the disputed ballots apart. “We believe it’s at a minimum of 20,000. That’s the floor,” he said. Federal law prohibits noncitizens from voting in federal elections, and the department says some people on the list have already been charged over alleged illegal registration and voting.

The department sued on October 15 and asked for emergency relief four days later. Carter scheduled a hearing for next week instead of ruling by Thursday afternoon, and the department told the appeals court that the silence amounted to a constructive denial of its request, which is why it went to the Ninth Circuit before any lower court ruling existed. The emergency motion says Los Angeles County alone has already processed more than 331,000 mail ballots.

The case is being watched well beyond California. States run their own elections in the United States, and the November 3 midterms will decide control of Congress. The Trump administration has moved on several fronts at once this month, between this suit, a surge of Justice Department election monitors that states are preparing to shadow, and court fights over voter identification, all ten days before the vote.