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Since the second Trump administration began, the government has charged 156 people with illegal voting out of 227,000,000 registered voters.

Posted by Letters from an American, Checked

Polygraph verdictTrue
Sources
2 support2 context
Said
1 time·
Confidence
85%
Letters from an AmericanOct 27, 2026
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Two sources directly report the figure: Reuters (tier1) quotes acting Deputy AG Trent McCotter saying DOJ has charged 156 immigrants with voting or registering to vote unlawfully, and CBS (tier2) reports 156 charged with voting-fraud offenses since the start of the Trump administration against 227 million registered voters.

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What was said

… It is a crime to vote in federal elections if you are not a U s. Citizen, and the number of times such votes are cast is vanishingly low. As May notes, since the second Trump administration began, it has charged, not obtained convictions, charged just 156 people out of 227,000,000 registered voters. But Trump has made the big lie that Democrats win elections only through fraud central to his hopes of keeping MAGA in control of the government, and he is weaponizing the government against his political opponents by using the idea of illegal voting as …
Letters from an American · · from the transcriptPost →

What we found

Supports. Reuters reports acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter said the Justice Department has charged 156 immigrants with voting or registering to vote unlawfully.[1]

Supports. CBS News reports that 156 people have been charged with voting-fraud related offenses since the beginning of the Trump administration, according to the Justice Department, with 227 million registered voters in the U.S.[3]

Context. The charges include registration-related offenses as well as illegal voting, so the 156 figure is not strictly limited to casting unlawful ballots; the claim's 'illegal voting' wording is a slight simplification.[1][2]

Context. AP reports the Justice Department had charged about 90 people for election misconduct before a October 19 California sweep, and ProPublica reports many noncitizen voter lists shrank to a handful of charges, consistent with a small charged count.[2][4]

Sources

4 sources: 2 fact-checkers, 2 tier 2

  1. 1Trump DOJ issues subpoenas in California noncitizen voting probe, escalating pressure campaignreuters.com · fact-checker · cited for: supports, context
  2. 2Justice Department charges more than 2 dozen in California sweep targeting noncitizen votersapnews.com · fact-checker · cited for: context
  3. 3Federal agents knock on doors to track down possible ...cbsnews.com · tier 2 · cited for: supports
  4. 4Inside Trump's Futile Hunt for Noncitizen Voters - ProPublicapropublica.org · tier 2 · cited for: context

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