Measure DD would allow non-citizens to vote in municipal elections in Santa Ana

October 26, 2024 By Jas Kang 2 Comments

SANTA ANA, Calif. — It has been illegal for non-citizens to cast a ballot in federal and statewide elections since Congress passed the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act in 1996. But, that could change in a local community going into the future.

Santa Ana residents will have their say on if non-citizens will be allowed to vote in municipal elections, with Measure DD on the ballot. Jose Perea has lived in the city since he moved from Mexico 18 years ago to be reunited with his family. According to Census data, roughly 20% of residents in Santa Ana don’t have citizenship.

The measure has opposition and support from around the community, with both sides stating their cases on why they want to see the measure passed or denied.

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Widespread coalition is opposing noncitizen voting ballot measure in Santa Ana

October 19, 2024 By Art Pedroza 4 Comments

The Orange County Register, the Santa Ana Police Union, the Mayor, “Santa Ana Citizens for Voting” and a business community PAC are among those actively opposing Measure DD on the November ballot in Santa Ana, which if passed, would allow for noncitizen voting in city elections.  Whether it passes or fails, the outcome of Measure DD will potentially have national significance for the effort to expand noncitizen voting in California and the nation.

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Measure DD has been controversial from its origin.  It was placed on the ballot late last year in a contentious 4-3 vote of the City Council, with the Council majority overruling city staff recommendations on the wording of the ballot measure to add favorable language.  But this summer, Orange County Superior Court Judge Kimberly A. Knill ruled in favor of a lawsuit and ordered removal of wording she found to be biased and illegal, violating the California Elections Code by creating a prejudice on the ballot to encourage voters to vote for the measure.  The Judge’s Order is available here: https://usjf.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Hearing-on-Petition-1.pdf.  

The more neutral presentation of the measure is now on ballots and voting in Santa Ana is underway.

Other than ballot arguments, there is no visible sign of a campaign in favor of Measure DD in Santa Ana, such as signs, telephone calls, direct-mail, door-hangers, canvassing, or electronic advertising.

However, a significant coalition of Santa Ana residents and stakeholders has arisen in opposition to the measure:

James V. Lacy, who brought the successful lawsuit challenging the biased wording of the original ballot measure language said, “it looks to me like the proponents of noncitizen voting in Santa Ana were relying entirely on rigged ballot language to pass their measure.  They failed at that because of our lawsuit.  They have now made another big mistake in not putting up a campaign to actually ask voters for their support, and it looks to me like Measure DD is going to lose.”

Click here to read the full article in New Santa Ana

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Swaim: Santa Ana benches a teacher for too much transparency

September 16, 2024 By Will Swaim 1 Comment

In mid-August, with parents prepping children for the new school year and classrooms being swept and decorated to welcome them, Brenda Lebsack was thinking about advertising. 

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Lebsack, a Santa Ana teacher, wants parents to know that most kids in Santa Ana’s public schools can’t read or do math at grade level. 

“My message is, ‘70% of SAUSD students are not meeting reading standards and 80% are not math proficient, yet we have a 91% graduation rate,” Lebsack says. “Our graduation rates keep going up while our academic scores keep going down.”

So, she called a phone number on the city’s bus stops and asked about advertising that fact in Spanish and English on bus benches and shelters. She even proposed including a QR code for a quick link to the government data supporting her claim.

The woman on the other end of the line “told me some of the basic parameters and rules of the ads, basically that they cannot be political,” Lebsack recalls. “She said she would email me information within a day. 

Lebsack says she “waited and waited, but the call never came.” So she called again and left a message. The advertising representative texted back, “Good morning, unfortunately the topics are political and we are unable to move further. Thank you for the inquiry. Have a great day!”

It’s unclear how letting parents know that their schools are failing is “political” – Lebsack’s ad copy doesn’t mention a candidate or campaign. But it’s very clear that the First Amendment prohibits Santa Ana – prohibits every American government – from censoring speech, especially when it’s political. 

The First Amendment declares, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

From the earliest days of the republic, the courts have said that clear limit on government power applies to every level of government in America – not just to Congress or the president, in other words, but also to state and local governments and districts, from Washington, D.C. to Sacramento and all the way down to Santa Ana and the bus benches Santa Ana owns on the streets of the fourteenth-largest city in America’s most populous state.

Isn’t Brenda Lebsack’s message about her city’s schools protected by the First Amendment?

I put that question to Focus Media Group, the Florida-based company that manages bus bench advertising for Santa Ana and governments all over the country. In an email, Focus Media’s director of municipal relations replied, “We do not set the advertising standards or determine what is deemed acceptable for our clients’ advertisements.”

Who does? “These guidelines are dictated by our municipal contracts, in this case, specifically with the City of Santa Ana,” the spokesperson said. “Currently, we are seeking additional guidance from the city to ensure our actions are fully compliant with their requirements.”

I followed with a question about how Focus makes these decisions. “Does your company interpret those guidelines in order to determine whether advertising content is permissible?” I asked. “Or do you send all advertising content to city staff for their direct approval?”

“Please refer to the comments in my previous email,” he replied. “We have no further comments at this time.”

Click here to read the full article in the OC Register

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Noncitizens banned from voting in federal elections but not some local races

July 20, 2024 By Hannah Wiley and Hannah Fry 2 Comments

“I am not aware of a single incident of a noncitizen casting an illegal ballot in San Francisco,” Chiu said. “These (voter fraud) claims are simply not based in reality…and I would also say they misunderstand the operational aspects of current voting programs that protect election integrity.”

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Chiu later defended Proposition N as city attorney against a lawsuit filed by a conservative legal group seeking to block the law. A San Francisco Superior Court judge initially ruled the law had violated the state Constitution, before an appeals court overturned that decision and allowed the program to continue. The ruling also applied to Oakland’s law, which faced a similar legal challenge.

Attorney and conservative pundit James Lacy, who led the lawsuits in San Francisco and Oakland, filed another lawsuit in May challenging language used in Santa Ana’s ballot measure.

“If we possess anything important in our citizenship, it’s the ability to vote and to participate in the body politic of our localities in our nation,” Lacy said. “When a noncitizen is allowed to vote, it diminishes the value of citizenship. It dilutes the vote of all citizens.”

The impact of the noncitizen voting laws remains unclear.

In 2018, only 65 noncitizen residents registered to vote in San Francisco’s school board election, and 59 turned in ballots, according to the city’s Department of Elections. Those numbers dropped to 36 registered voters in 2020, with 31 ballots cast.

When three San Francisco school board were removed from office in a February 2022 recall election, registered noncitizen voters swelled to 328, and 235 people voted. Registration numbers dropped dramatically for another election that fall. Noncitizen ballots in the last four school board elections accounted for a fraction of the more than 1.3 million total votes cast.

Up until 1926, noncitizen voting was commonplace in most states, Hayduk said. Citizenship mattered less than other societal markers of success, such as race, gender and class, meaning white male landowners, regardless of citizenship status, usually had access to the ballot box.

“This idea that the vote is eternal, it’s always been fixed, is incorrect,” he said. “It’s evolving. Democracy is evolving.”

Click here to read the full article at LA Times

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Judge rules Santa Ana must eliminate prejudicial language from noncitizen voting rights measure

July 12, 2024 By Jonathan Horwitz Leave a Comment

Orange County Superior Court Judge Kimberly Knill ruled Thursday that a Santa Ana ballot measure asking voters to decide whether to allow noncitizens to vote in municipal elections will need to be rewritten before ballots are printed in August.

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Knill made clear that this case is not about whether noncitizens should be able to vote in municipal elections, a right she said has been established by case law in certain circumstances in city elections. Rather, the case is about whether specific language city officials used to draft the ballot measure is prejudicial and could sway the results of the election.

The ballot measure had been set to ask voters: “Shall the city of Santa Ana city charter be amended to allow, by the November 2028 general municipal election, noncitizen city residents, including those who are taxpayers and parents, to vote in all city of Santa Ana municipal elections?”

The phrase “including those who are taxpayers and parents” needs to be removed, Knill ordered.

In a lawsuit filed in May with the county’s Superior Court, James V. Lacy, a local attorney and conservative pundit, along with the United States Justice Foundation, a conservative legal nonprofit, the California Public Policy Foundation, a think tank, and Pasquale Talarico, a Santa Ana resident, argued the wording “including those who are taxpayers and parents” could be misleading to voters.

On Thursday, Knill agreed with them and said she will promptly issue an order for the OC Registrar of Voters to remove that controversial clause from the measure before ballots are printed in August.

California elections code requires that ballot language be “neither argumentative nor likely to create prejudice for or against the measure.” Knill said the way Santa Ana wrote the measure would “likely create prejudice for the ballot.”

“The introduction of the words taxpayers and parents is not impartial,” Knill said. “Instead it reflects partiality because it excludes other categories of voters who are not taxpayers and parents.”

“The language is flawed because it implies a no vote will disenfranchise only taxpayers and parents, which is not true,” she added. “It will mean all noncitizens cannot vote. Paying taxes or parenting a child are not relevant to the ballot question.”

Click here to read the full article in the OC Register

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California city keeps controversial language on ballot measure for non-citizens to vote: ‘Sugarcoating’

June 27, 2024 By Danielle Wallace 1 Comment

Santa Ana City Council accused of using ‘partisan’ language on ballot measure asking whether non-citizen ‘taxpayers and parents’ can vote

James Lacy, an attorney and activist involved in the litigation, told Politico that though he is against non-citizens voting in elections, he did not oppose the issue remaining on the ballot in general. 

What they’re doing, without a question, is sugarcoating the ballot in favor of a vote for it by making a statement that is positive,” he reportedly said. “That is advocacy – you can’t do that and have a fair election.”

Lacy also told LAist in early June that the measure’s controversial wording violates the election code because “it prejudicially informs the voter in a way to encourage a yes vote on the ballot measure.”

It is illegal for non-citizens to vote in federal elections, but the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 states that non-citizens are permitted to participate in other elections if they are “authorized to vote for such other purpose under a State constitution or statute or a local ordinance.”

Other cities in California, like San Francisco and Oakland, have advanced efforts to allow non-citizens to vote in local contests, including school board elections, in recent years.

In 2016, a ballot measure known as Proposition N passed in San Francisco, allowing non-citizen parents and guardians of children residing in the city to vote in local school board elections. 

Faced with legal challenges, a San Francisco Superior Court judge later said the measure was unconstitutional. The California Court of Appeal reversed that ruling last August, deeming that state and local governments, in particular charter cities, have the power to enforce their own election rules at the municipal level. Like San Francisco, Santa Ana is a charter city. 

“I believe that we can continue to challenge this issue of non-citizen voting, probably with better results in the federal court system,” Lacy told LAist. “The California state court system, particularly the appellate system, is really populated by liberal Democratic judges.”

Click here to read the full article in FoxNews

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Push to let noncitizens vote in this California city hinges on 7 words

June 25, 2024 By Emily Schultheis 1 Comment

The effort to extend voting rights to noncitizens in Santa Ana comes amid a countermove by national and state-level Republicans to explicitly ban the practice.

Opponents of a measure to let noncitizens vote are seizing on seven words they say will skew the November vote in one of Southern California’s largest cities.

The Santa Ana City Council wants voters to decide whether noncitizen residents of the city, “including those who are taxpayers and parents,” can participate in all municipal elections.

Noncitizen voting for presidential and congressional offices is illegal, but federal law says nothing about local elections. Various efforts to give noncitizens the vote in those contests — including in San Francisco in 2016 and in Oakland in 2022 — have put increased focus on the issue, leading Republicans on both the state and national level to seek to curtail the process.

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In Congress, Republicans introduced the SAVE Act, which would require voters to show proof of citizenship when they register to vote. The issue is finding its way to state-level ballots, too: Missouri, South Carolina, Iowa, Kentucky and Wisconsin have already qualified ballot measures to explicitly ban noncitizen voting, and several others may still follow suit. (Six other states have passed similar ballot measures between 2018 and 2022.)

In Santa Ana, where largely Hispanic noncitizens make up nearly a quarter of the population, conservative organizations including the California Public Policy Foundation challenged the specific ballot wording around “taxpayers and parents” in court, saying it will unfairly influence voters in favor of the proposal.

James Lacy, an attorney and activist involved in the suit, told POLITICO he’s not opposed to the issue appearing on the ballot in general, even though he is personally against the idea of letting noncitizens vote.

“What they’re doing, without a question, is sugarcoating the ballot in favor of a vote for it by making a statement that is positive,” he said. “That is advocacy — you can’t do that and have a fair election.”

Click here to read the full article in Politico

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Santa Ana voters to decide if councilmembers get raise — it would give leaders $78,000 to start

June 21, 2024 By Destiny Torres 1 Comment

If approved by voters councilmembers would make 33% of the salary of an OC Superior Court Judge, more than any other OC city.

Santa Ana voters will be asked in November about making several changes to the city’s charter, including one that would boost councilmembers’ annual pay by more than $65,000.

Elected members of the City Council, including the mayor, receive $12,000 per year. If the ballot measure is approved by voters, the pay would instead be set to 33% of the salary of an OC Superior Court Judge, which currently would equate to $78,696 per year for the councilmembers of Orange County’s second largest city.

The council voted 4-3 Tuesday night, with Mayor Valerie Amezcua and councilmembers Benjamin Vazquez and David Penaloza opposed, to put the ballot question to voters.

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Councilmember Thai Viet Phan said this is about getting “the next generation of leaders” to serve the city.

“I think it’s really important for the future of Santa Ana to be able to recruit and get working-class people, middle-class people to be interested in serving on the City Council of Santa Ana,” Phan said during Tuesday’s meeting. “Not everybody has a flexible job. Not everybody has their own business. Not everybody is retired. A lot of people have to choose whether to serve their city or not because they can’t afford to do it.”

In the vast majority of cities, council positions are not full-time jobs. Phan said in a Wednesday phone interview the proposed pay change wouldn’t necessarily change that. Whether or not one works full-time on city business or part-time while working another job would be up to each council member to decide, she said.

“I think most of us work closer to full-time than part-time as a councilmember,” Phan said. “It’s essentially trying to bring the compensation up to a place where it actually reflects the kind of work that we do. We’ve done a lot more programing, I think, outreach and things like that for our community.”

Councilmember Phil Bacerra said a higher pay would help get leadership in the city of more than 310,000 residents moved toward a living wage.

“One other statistic I’d like to throw out is that in California, fast food workers make two-and-a-half times more than we do today. They flip burgers, we deal with billion dollar budgets,” Bacerra said. “There’s a stark contrast there and a difference in pay.”

The proposed pay increase was linked to the salaries of OC Superior Court judges, Phan said, because those are set by the state. This way, it won’t become a political battle every election cycle, she added.

In Anaheim, Orange County’s largest city with 346,000 residents, councilmembers receive $18,000 per year, plus another $10,000 in benefits. In Orange County’s third largest city, Irvine, elected leaders make $10,560 per year with a majority of the councilmembers also receiving $8,580 for an auto allowance and more than $1,600 in pension benefits.

At the county level, members of the OC Board of Supervisors make about $184,000 annually.

Click here to read the full article in the OC Register

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Santa Ana council stands firm on noncitizen voting ballot measure language despite legal challenge

June 20, 2024 By Destiny Torres 3 Comments

A council majority decided to leave ballot language as written for a measure that could extend voting to noncitizens in Santa Ana, despite orders from an OC Superior Court judge to  make changes.

Last fall, a majority of the Santa Ana City Council approved asking local voters in the upcoming November election whether noncitizens should be allowed to vote in city elections.

The ballot measure is set to ask voters: “Shall the city of Santa Ana city charter be amended to allow, by the November 2028 general municipal election, noncitizen city residents, including those who are taxpayers and parents, to vote in all city of Santa Ana municipal elections?”

In a lawsuit filed last month with the county’s Superior Court, James V. Lacy, a local attorney, along with the United States Justice Foundation, the California Public Policy Foundation and Pasquale Talarico, a Santa Ana resident, argued the wording “including those who are taxpayers and parents” could be misleading to voters.

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Orange County Superior Court Judge Kimberly A. Knill agreed earlier this month and ordered Santa Ana City Clerk Jennifer Hall and OC Registrar of Voters Bob Page to make the changes sought or make their case in court.

“The language, I find to be unbiased. It is simply describing who noncitizens are. Noncitizens pay over $145 million in taxes in Orange County today,” Councilmember Johnathan Hernandez said during Tuesday night’s City Council meeting. “Orange County wouldn’t be the county that it is without noncitizens.”

Click here to read the full article in the Orange County Register

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Santa Ana ordered by court to amend noncitizen voting ballot measure language

June 6, 2024 By Destiny Torres 1 Comment

City staff can either choose to amend the ballot wording or go to court later this month.

An OC Superior Court judge has ordered Santa Ana to update the ballot language for a measure about extending voting to noncitizens following a lawsuit filed last month that alleged the wording would be misleading to voters.

Last fall, a majority of the Santa Ana City Council approved of asking local voters in the Nov. 5 election whether or not noncitizens should be allowed to vote in city elections.

The ballot language the council approve is: “Shall the city of Santa Ana city charter be amended to allow, by the November 2028 general municipal election, noncitizen city residents, including those who are taxpayers and parents, to vote in all city of Santa Ana municipal elections?”

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In a lawsuit filed with the county’s Superior Court, James V. Lacy, a local attorney, along with the United States Justice Foundation, the California Public Policy Foundation and Pasquale Talarico, a Santa Ana resident, argue that adding the wording “including those who are taxpayers and parents” could influence the outcome of the election.

Lacy said although he does not agree with allowing noncitizen residents to vote in local elections, the intention of the suit is not to take away that decision from Santa Ana voters but to ensure the wording on the ballot is neutral. Those who filed the suit, he said, are asking that the court order the city to modify the ballot question and refrain from printing the original ballot question approved by the council.

“Under the election code, it specifically states that you can’t put language into the ballot measure that would prejudice a person to vote either for or against it. We went ahead and looked at the language, and it really seemed that this was the Santa Ana City Council trying to rig the election in favor of a vote for noncitizen voting,” Lacy said. “Our view is that there’s no real reason to put (parents and taxpayers) in there. If you take those words out, the measure language then would fairly and neutrally present what the issue is.”

Click here to read the full article in the OC Register

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