DOJ's McCotter Writes LA County Counsel That Knowingly Tabulating Ballots of Voters Federal Agencies Flag as Noncitizens Risks Aiding and Abetting a Federal Crime

The letter is dated October 16, 2026 and is signed by Trent McCotter, Acting Deputy Attorney General, to Peter M. Bollinger of the Los Angeles County Counsel’s Office. It answers the county’s October 15 letter. It says: “If persons knowingly tabulate ballots cast by individuals identified by federal agencies as noncitizens, they risk becoming aiders and abettors to a federal crime.”

The letter says the Department hand delivered a dataset on October 13 identifying more than 20,000 individuals. It says the investigative list includes individuals residing outside Los Angeles County, and that the Department requested only temporary ballot segregation pending citizenship verification.

I did not read the letter as a PDF or on a DOJ page. The text above is from the image of the letter that the President posted on Truth Social, as transcribed in the trumpstruth.org archive; AP (via PBS) quotes the same sentence. Follow-on to 2026-10-15–doj-sues-california-weber-la-county-logan-cd-cal-2-26-cv-12025-block-tabulating-ballots-of-20000-flagged-voters and 2026-10-13–doj-letters-give-california-48-hours-on-likely-noncitizen-list-demand-la-county-segregate-ballots; the docket activity is at 2026-10-16–calif-and-la-county-oppose-doj-related-case-notice-two-civil-rights-coalitions-move-to-intervene-us-v-california. The President’s post about the letter is 2026-10-16–trump-truth-social-they-will-all-go-to-jail-post-over-doj-la-county-letter.