Bill Essayli, First Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California, whose office announced the indictments. Official Justice Department portrait (public domain).
The first noncitizen voting indictments announced in the Central District of California charge three green card holders with lying on their citizenship applications, not with casting illegal ballots.
A federal grand jury in Santa Ana returned noncitizen voting indictments on Oct. 28 against three Los Angeles County residents, accusing each of lying under oath on a naturalization application by swearing they had never claimed U.S. citizenship or registered to vote. All three were among the 28 green card holders federal prosecutors charged across California on Oct. 19, and the indictments mark the point at which those cases move from a prosecutor’s complaint to formal felony charges.
The detail that matters most is the charge itself. Each defendant faces one count of making a false statement under oath on a naturalization application, which the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Central District of California says carries a maximum of five years in prison. The case against them rests on the answers they gave USCIS on Form N-400, the citizenship application, which asks every applicant whether they have ever claimed to be a citizen, registered to vote or voted.
| Defendant (age, nationality) | Registered to vote | Voted, per prosecutors | Alleged false N-400 statement |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sulema de León (35, Mexico) | June 2013 | November 2020 | September 2019 |
| Rouzbeh Seyamaknejad (63, Canada) | December 2018 | None alleged | January 2024 |
| Butleng Taing (43, Cambodia) | July 2021 | November 2022 and November 2024 | August 2025 |
Why prosecutors are building noncitizen voting indictments on the citizenship form
Seyamaknejad’s case shows the strategy plainly. Prosecutors do not say he ever voted; his alleged crime is registering as a citizen in 2018 and then, in 2024, telling USCIS under penalty of perjury that he had not. De León’s registration dates to 2013. In both cases the N-400 is a recent, signed federal document, which is easier ground for a prosecution than a state registration card filed years earlier. The release does not name the statute, though a five-year maximum is consistent with 18 U.S.C. 1015, which covers false statements in naturalization matters.
The release also does not say whether any of the three applications was approved, denied or still pending, and it does not say when the defendants will be arraigned.
The immigration exposure may outlast the criminal case. Under the Immigration and Nationality Act, falsely claiming citizenship to register to vote is a ground of deportation and a permanent bar to future admission, and unlawful voting is a separate ground of deportation. The only exception is narrow, for people whose parents were citizens and who reasonably believed they were citizens themselves. As earlier coverage of the Pennsylvania cases explained, those grounds generally cannot be waived.
More indictments are likely in the coming weeks
First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said the grand jury “has started returning indictments against noncitizens who registered to vote, including those who voted in prior elections.” The timing is largely set by law. Felony charges brought by complaint must be followed by a grand jury indictment, and the Speedy Trial Act generally requires one within 30 days of arrest. That puts the remaining defendants charged by complaint on Oct. 19, in the Central District and the state’s three other federal districts, on track for grand jury action by mid- to late November unless deadlines are extended or waived.
The cases are unfolding beside the Justice Department’s broader fight over California ballots. On Oct. 28, a federal judge refused to order California to hold back about 20,000 mail ballots from voters the department calls likely noncitizens, a list the Oct. 19 announcement said includes all 28 defendants. The criminal prosecutions and the ballot dispute rest on the same records, but they test different things: the ballot case asks who controls a state’s vote count, while the indictments ask what individual applicants told USCIS. The original California charges and the department’s five-state roundup show how widely the same theory is being used.
For green card holders who once registered to vote by mistake, the practical lesson from these cases is that the N-400 answer can create a new federal crime even when the original registration is years old. Each defendant is presumed innocent unless proven guilty in court.
This article is for general information and is not legal advice.
Sources
- U.S. Attorney’s Office, Central District of California: Federal Grand Jury Indicts 3 Foreign Nationals Who Registered to Vote in California (Oct. 28, 2026)
- U.S. Attorney’s Office, Central District of California: 11 Foreign Nationals Arrested in California on Federal Charges (Oct. 19, 2026)
- USCIS: Form N-400, Application for Naturalization
- 8 U.S.C. 1227 (deportable aliens, including false claims to citizenship and unlawful voting)
- 18 U.S.C. 3161 (Speedy Trial Act time limits)
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