The governor’s office said California has acted to protect the Nov. 3, 2026, election and to push back against federal interference; the office listed new laws, nearly $40 million in recent funding for counties, and statewide coordination through the Office of Emergency Services.
The office said the U.S. Department of Justice tried and failed three times last week to throw out about 20,000 California votes it claimed with “high confidence” came from noncitizens who received a ballot. The office said the claim was proven false almost immediately by the department's own staff and that multiple federal judges rejected the attempts.
To prevent similar interventions, the office said Gov. earlier this year signed 15 bills focused on election security and accountability and included nearly $40 million in his final budget for county election operations; the money was described as support for hiring staff, buying counting technology, and expanding voter education.
The budget items the office listed include $29 million for county staffing and equipment to speed counting; $5 million for county-level voter outreach and education; $5 million for statewide voter outreach through the Secretary of State; and $750,000 for statewide efforts to combat mis- and disinformation.
The office described several new criminal and administrative protections that take effect for Election Day. Major measures it listed include: AB 282, which the office said makes it a felony to seize ballots, election records or certified voting technology before results are certified; SB 259, which the office said makes it a felony for supervisors to direct interference with delivery or return of vote-by-mail ballots; SB 884, which the office said requires vote-by-mail dropoff locations to be open at least 30 days before the election and expands protections around polling places; and SB 1420, which the office said directs the Secretary of State to set uniform procedures allowing a voter to surrender a vote-by-mail ballot at a polling place without the identification envelope.
The governor’s office said it also sent a letter over the weekend to the chief judges of the four federal district courts in California with resources for evaluating search-warrant requests for election materials; the office said the step was intended to ensure warrants are evaluated so election integrity is upheld and lawful votes are not prevented from being counted.
The Office of Emergency Services, the office said, is coordinating threat and cybersecurity work year round through its State Threat Assessment Center and California Cybersecurity Integration Center; those teams are described as informing partners about disinformation, cyber threats and weather or infrastructure risks that could affect voting sites.
"Californians deserve a free and fair election, one they know is safe from meddling, and that is exactly what we will deliver," Governor Gavin Newsom said in the release. The office said no state has done more to prepare for potential federal attempts to interfere with California’s election, and that it stands ready to prosecute violations of the new laws.
State
Gavin Newsom
Governor · Democrat
Named 3 times in this story.
Portrait: Official portrait
Sources & methodology
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