WASHINGTON — The Justice Department on Monday announced election-related charges against 48 noncitizens in five states, in cases built on claims of illegal voting, fraudulent registration and false citizenship statements in voting or naturalization papers.
According to the department, the cases are spread across Pennsylvania, California, Florida, New York and Nevada. Most defendants are lawful permanent residents. That status lets a person live and work in the United States, but it does not allow voting in federal elections.
California accounts for 28 of the 48 defendants, spread across all four federal districts in the state. Some face felony counts. In the Central District, 13 defendants were charged in cases that include false statements in a naturalization application, the department said.
Omar Alexander Muñoz, a 72-year-old Belizean national, is among those charged in the Central District. The department says Muñoz claimed U.S. citizenship to register in September 2019 and then voted four times: in 2020, twice in 2022 and in 2024. On his naturalization application, though, he swore he had never claimed to be a citizen. The department calls that a lie.
Nine of the defendants are in Pennsylvania. Four of them were charged in the Eastern District. The Middle District has the other five. Each is charged with voting by an alien, the department said. The Eastern District group includes Alfredo Santiesteban, 73, described as an illegal alien from Cuba, who allegedly voted in the 2024 general election.
Six more defendants come from Florida, where all the charges were filed in the Middle District. One Florida defendant, Jamie Orlando Sosa Sardina, 60, is a Cuban national. An indictment charges him with claiming U.S. citizenship falsely in order to vote, and with voting as an alien — both, the department says, after a registration in 2022 and ballots cast in the federal general elections of 2022 and 2024.
Four defendants are in New York: three in the Eastern District, one in the Northern District. In the Eastern District, the department pointed to Eoin Cranney, 35, an Irish national. Cranney agreed to an interview with the agents. He told them he is not a citizen, the department said. Registration came in 2024, and so did a ballot in that year’s federal general election, cast knowing he was not a citizen, he told them.
The last defendant is in Nevada. Jullie Ann Sumalinog Moore, 44, a Filipino national, is charged there with voting by an alien; the department says she voted in an election held in part for president, vice president, the Senate and the House of Representatives.
Not every California case is a felony. In the Eastern District, the charges are misdemeanors. Voting by an alien there carries a statutory maximum of one year in federal prison, the department said.
The charges were announced eight days before the Nov. 3 general election.
The department noted that a complaint, indictment and information merely contain accusations. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.
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