Staff Reports
A federal grand jury has quietly started returning indictments against noncitizens registered to vote in Los Angeles County, and the timing could not be more awkward for the people who keep insisting this never happens. First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli announced the move — naming three individuals charged with federal election fraud — just as a judge questioned his authority to lead the office. This is the kind of inconvenient evidence that makes people who prefer slogans over facts squirm.
What the federal grand jury found
The grand jury returned indictments against three noncitizens now accused of illegally registering to vote in California. The defendants were identified as Sulema De Leon, a Mexican national accused of registering in 2013 and voting in 2020; Butleng Taing, a Cambodian national accused of registering in 2021 and voting in 2022 and 2024; and Rouzbeh Seyamaknejad, a Canadian national accused of registering in 2018. Those are federal election fraud charges, plain and simple — the sort of violations that undercut confidence in our elections and deserve to be pursued vigorously.
Timing, a judge’s ruling, and the optics
At almost the same moment the indictments were announced, a federal judge ruled that Bill Essayli was “unlawfully running the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles” and barred him from participating in two criminal cases, giving the Justice Department a short window to seek a stay. Coincidence? Call it an unfortunate coincidence if you like, but anyone who studies politics knows timing is rarely accidental. Democrats who insist this never happens will now have to explain why a grand jury has produced indictments and why the DOJ is moving to keep prosecutions on track despite judicial pushback.
Why this matters for election integrity
Noncitizen voting is not a theoretical problem. Every unlawful registration and ballot dilutes the weight of a lawful American vote. Los Angeles election officials have admitted they lack an independent, consistent way to verify citizenship beyond trusting local records — a trust-me approach that invites errors and abuse. If we want elections people believe in, we must stop pretending that every error is harmless and start demanding systems that verify eligibility before ballots are cast.
What should happen next
The Justice Department should follow the grand jury’s work wherever the evidence leads, and the courts should resolve the questions about who can properly run prosecutions without letting technical disputes become shields for inaction. At the same time, lawmakers should adopt commonsense reforms — voter ID, better citizenship verification at registration, and audits that catch mistakes before they become scandals. Call it law and order at the ballot box. Call it common sense. Either way, pretending this problem doesn’t exist won’t fix it.
