Honduran National Charged with Voter Registration Fraud in Los Angeles
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A Honduran citizen was arrested on felony charges of fraudulent voter registration in California, marking the first case in a DOJ-led investigation into non-citizen voting.
Los Angeles federal prosecutors announced Friday that a Honduran national, identified as Darwin Jonathan Rivera Flores, was charged with two felony counts of fraudulent voter registration and false claim of U.S. citizenship. The charges carry a potential deportation sentence if he is convicted. Rivera Flores, a green-card holder who entered the United States during the George W. Bush administration, allegedly registered to vote without being a citizen but did not cast a ballot, according to the Department of Justice.
"Today’s arrest is the first of many to come. Unfortunately, because states like California allow non-citizens to easily register to vote and receive a ballot by mail, there’s no telling how many non-citizens are currently registered to vote," said First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli in a statement.
Essayli reiterated the Justice Department’s request that California comply with a pending audit of its voter rolls, a demand previously made by Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon. The case follows Rivera Flores’ earlier misdemeanor conviction for disrupting immigration law-enforcement operations at a federal building in Camarillo, for which he received one year of probation.
The White House cited the arrest as evidence that claims of non-citizen voting are not unfounded. White House spokesperson Lauren Bis told reporters that “the evidence of non-citizens registering to vote in our elections continues to pile up.”
California is scheduled to vote in November on a ballot measure that would add voter-ID and citizenship-verification requirements for registration. The proposal is backed by state Republican legislators Tony Strickland and Carl DeMaio.