Bill Essayli warned California’s vote counters they could face criminal liability on the same day a federal judge ruled he is unlawfully serving as Los Angeles’ top federal prosecutor.
Essayli made the threat in court over 20,000 Californians’ mail ballots. Homeland Security flagged those voters as suspected noncitizens using the public voter roll and a data broker’s records, and the Justice Department wants their ballots set aside until they prove citizenship.
The judge hearing the ballot case serves on the same federal court where Essayli prosecutes, and he ordered the threats against state and county election officials to stop immediately. Essayli says he will keep “serving in my current role” until the Supreme Court settles whether he can hold the job.
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Former Miss Switzerland tells House Judiciary Democrats Trump raped her in a Plaza Hotel suite in 1993, in their report on his Epstein ties.
Today’s GovBrief News
Health Secretary Kennedy says 500 million Arabs “don’t produce science” or literature and don’t win Nobels, when asked about Michigan’s Senate race with Democrat El-Sayed.
Source: The Independent
October 27, 2026Details
Trump approves letting defeated Brazilian presidential candidate Flávio Bolsonaro into the US, after Brazil’s Supreme Court ordered him to surrender his passport.
Source: CNN
October 27, 2026Details
Trump urges making Venezuela the 51st state while touting 1 million barrels of its oil, pitching the idea to oil billionaire Harold Hamm.
Source: The Hill
October 27, 2026Details
UN Ambassador Waltz holds up a photo of Fidel Castro’s Rolex to defend the Cuba embargo, a day before the 34th annual vote to end it.
Source: UPI
October 27, 2026Details
Pentagon tells Congress the Iran war has cost the military $47.1 billion, not counting damage from Iranian strikes on US bases.
Source: USA Today
October 27, 2026Details
Federal Election Commission shuts its filing system after a hacking attempt a week before the midterms, blocking required last-minute reports on super PAC spending.
Source: Reuters
October 27, 2026Details
Justice Department warns California officials they could face “criminal liability” for knowingly counting noncitizen ballots, as it demands 20,000 set aside, drawing a judge’s rebuke.
Source: News from the States
October 27, 2026Details
Trump again says he’ll respect midterm results only “if they’re honest elections,” after saying he directed the Justice Department’s suit to block Alaska’s Senate certification.
Source: USA Today
October 27, 2026Details
Grand jury refuses the Justice Department’s bid to indict Jan. 6 committee star witness Cassidy Hutchinson over her testimony about Trump, a US official says.
Source: NBC News
October 27, 2026Details
Administration appeals the DC golf course ruling as the judge asks how Trump’s Nov. 15 closure vow squares with Justice Department assurances of “no plan to close.”
Source: The Washington Post [gift link]
October 27, 2026Details
Federal judge rules Bill Essayli is unlawfully serving as Los Angeles’ top federal prosecutor, after 18 months on the job without Senate confirmation.
Source: Spectrum News
October 27, 2026Details
ICE has jailed a mentally ill man since January to deport him to Jamaica, though AP finds records showing he was born in Florida.
Source: The Associated Press
October 27, 2026Details
Parents of ICU nurse Alex Pretti say the Justice Department has stonewalled them nine months after immigration agents killed him, withholding evidence from Minnesota prosecutors.
Source: KSTP St. Paul MN
October 27, 2026Details
Supreme Court lets stand a Justice Department deal with Texas killing the department’s own rule that let immigration judges pause some deportation cases.
Source: SCOTUSblog
October 27, 2026Details
Tennessee quietly stops accepting federal work permits for driver’s licenses, blocking an estimated 6,000 Dreamers and other authorized immigrants from renewing them.
Source: The Tennessee Lookout
October 27, 2026Details
Internal emails show then-28-year-old DOGE affiliate Jeremy Lewin signed USAID’s mass firings while its HR office had no record of him as an employee.
Source: Wired
October 27, 2026Details
IRS emails “Claim your child’s Trump Account!” naming Trump 11 times a week before the midterms, days after Social Security sent its own pitch.
Source: The Washington Post
October 27, 2026Details
Camden County, New Jersey, opens a $25 million, 60-unit transitional housing center for homeless residents with no referral required, part of its plan to end homelessness by 2030.
Source: The Philadelphia Inquirer
October 27, 2026Details
Senators Wyden and Schiff and 23 groups demand the administration release a secret court ruling faulting warrantless searches of Americans before Congress renews Section 702.
Source: Ars Technica
October 27, 2026Details