Federal authorities this week won a guilty plea from an illegal immigrant who cast votes in Michigan, plus announced indictments against two men they accused of voting illegally in New Jersey.
The Michigan case involved Jose Gargenis Vasquez Rosa, from the Dominican Republic, who was living here under the stolen identity of an American citizen living in Puerto Rico.
He obtained a driver’s license under the bogus identity in 2020 and registered to vote at the same time. He then cast a ballot in that November’s election.
“American citizens paid for the right to vote with their blood. This illegal alien lied to get into our country and stole that right. And we won’t let criminals undermine our elections,” said Jerome F. Gorgon Jr., the U.S. attorney in Detroit.
Vasquez Rosa pleaded guilty to illegal voting by an alien, false claim of citizenship and false statement on a passport application. He had attempted to gain a passport under the bogus identity, but was denied.
In New Jersey, authorities said Muhammad Shakeel and Muhammad Muzammal were legal permanent residents, or green card holders, but not yet citizens.
Mr. Shakeel registered to vote in 2018 while he was applying for a New Jersey identification card. He swore at the time that he was a citizen, authorities said, and he went on to cast a mail-in ballot in the 2020 election.
Mr. Muzammal went online to register to vote in 2020, also swearing that he was a citizen, prosecutors said.
He cast a mail-in ballot in 2020 and an in-person vote in New Jersey’s gubernatorial election in 2021.
Both men are also charged with lying about their votes when they applied for citizenship.
That’s often how noncitizen voting cases are flagged, according to experts. One of the standard checks in the process is to determine whether someone has voted despite lacking citizenship.
In this case, both men answered no, the indictment said. That earned them the additional charge.
Under federal law, only citizens are allowed to cast ballots in elections for national office.
Rizwan M. Khalid, lawyer for the two men, said they “maintain their innocence.”
“We strongly believe that the facts, once fully presented and examined, will demonstrate that the allegations against our clients are without merit,” he said.
The Washington Times has reached out to the lawyer for Mr. Shakeel and Mr. Muzammal for comment.
The cases are part of a Trump administration push to bring charges against noncitizens who cast ballots in American elections.
Armed with new data tools, federal investigators and authorities in some GOP-led states have been scouring their records seeking noncitizens on their voter rolls.
The Democratic National Committee on Friday threatened lawsuits against 10 GOP-led states that the DNC said are pondering cooperating with federal voter-roll cleansing efforts.
The party said if the states do sign agreements to share data with the feds, then remove any names the Justice Department flags, they could be violating federal law, depending on how the names are removed.
The 1993 National Voter Registration Act, or Motor-Voter, prodded states to make it easier to register to vote, but it also required them to take steps to keep their rolls cleansed of ineligible names.
One provision of the law creates a “quiet period” ahead of an election, where systematic removal of names is forbidden. DNC Litigation Director Daniel J. Freeman said the 45-day removal timeline that states are agreeing to in their deal with the feds could trample on the quiet period.
He also said removal under the terms laid out in the draft agreements between the feds and the states would violate Motor-Voter’s rules requiring notice to be given to those whose names are being booted.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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