California election official says federal agents threatened him over ‘voter fraud’
Keaton Denlay says agents handed him ‘poorly formatted Excel spreadsheet’ and threatened to criminally prosecute him A California county elections official is speaking out about the Department of Justice’s campaign against purported “voter fraud”, saying federal officials provided him a disorganized list of names filled with inaccuracies – and threatened to criminally prosecute him if he didn’t take action.
Keaton Denlay, the county clerk-recorder for Butte county, a region north of Sacramento, said a federal agent on Friday hand-delivered what appeared to be a printout of a “poorly formatted Excel spreadsheet with missing and jumbled information”. The DoJ claimed the list was of 47 “likely” noncitizens who were unlawfully registered to vote and demanded the county set aside their ballots. But Denlay said the document was riddled with errors and lacking crucial details, and he declined to act on it.
Read in depth: World
Spain train crash audio reveals exchanges between drivers and control centre
Recordings reported by the BBC appear to show a Renfe train being cleared to move while an Iryo train ahead remained stopped. Investigators have yet to establish the cause of...
Afghan opium poppy cultivation quadruples despite Taliban ban, UN says
The UN estimates that cultivation rose to about 43,000 hectares in 2026. The Taliban disputes the figure, while farmers describe difficulty replacing lost income.
Sources and context
The GuardianSource headline and summary supplied via NewsData.io. First collected by NewsJaws on 2026-10-29. This is an automated news brief, not original NewsJaws reporting. Dates reflect the source publication. Feed delays may apply.
Topics in this story
More from World
‘It’s been a whirlwind’: the Essex lawyer who quit her job and became voice of Netflix’s hit show Spike
‘You can see the water going down’: residents on edge as one of England’s worst-hit reservoirs dries up
Blockchain intelligence firms link North Korea to $6.3B hack on Binance
