Supreme Court rejects Trump request to set aside California ballots

The US Supreme Court on Monday, 2 November 2026, rejected a request from the Trump administration to require California to set aside thousands of mail ballots that the administration said came from non-citizens. The decision came one day before the midterm elections in which control of Congress is at stake.

Lower courts had already declined to order the segregation or exclusion of the ballots. The administration sought emergency relief from the Supreme Court. The justices turned down the application without a detailed public opinion, leaving the state's existing procedures in place for the counting of those ballots. California officials had argued that the claims lacked sufficient evidence of widespread non-citizen voting and that last-minute changes would disrupt the election.

The case formed part of a broader set of legal and administrative actions around voter eligibility and ballot integrity ahead of the midterms. The administration has pressed states to screen voter rolls more aggressively. California and other states have resisted what they describe as late and insufficiently supported demands. The Supreme Court's refusal to intervene means the disputed ballots will be processed under ordinary state rules.

Election administrators in California reported high early-voting volume. The state's mail-ballot system has been in place for several cycles. Disputes over eligibility typically move through administrative challenges and post-election litigation rather than pre-election court orders that halt counting. The Court's action preserves that sequence for this cycle.

How many ballots were actually subject to the administration's claims, and what share of them might later be found ineligible through normal processes, has not been quantified in public filings that accompanied the emergency application. Post-election audits and any subsequent challenges will determine the final status of individual ballots. The immediate effect of the ruling is that counting proceeds without the segregation order the administration sought.

The midterm results themselves will emerge over the coming days as states report. The California decision removes one potential point of pre-election disruption in a large state that is not itself holding a competitive Senate race this cycle but contributes a large number of House seats.