The Justice Department charged 28 voters in California.

LOS ANGELES — The Justice Department charged 28 lawful permanent residents in California on Monday with federal crimes tied to voting, and arrested 11 of them. The department said all 28 are green-card holders, not citizens, and that they are not allowed to vote in U.S. elections. The charges include false statements on a naturalization application and, for some, fraudulent registration. Each count carries a maximum of five years in federal prison. The sweep is called Operation Protect the Vote. The four U.S. attorney's offices in the state ran it. The Los Angeles Times reported that officials said 21 of the 28 are suspected of having cast ballots, some in more than one election, and that the other 17 “will be in custody in the near future.” About 16 million people voted in California in 2024.

The New York Times reported that Trent McCotter, a senior department official, said the 28 names were on a list of about 20,000 the administration sent California on Oct. 13, and that the government wants any mail ballots from those people set aside until citizenship is checked. The Associated Press noted that noncitizen voting is rare, hard to prove, and has not been shown to change the result of a race. Last week the department sued California to stop the state from counting mail ballots of people the federal government has flagged. That suit is not this arrest.

They are not U.S. citizens and are not permitted to vote.

The photograph is Monday night in Commerce. Two Homeland Security Investigations officers, vests marked POLICE, walk a handcuffed man in a tan shirt and red plaid pants toward a white vehicle. Jae C. Hong of the Associated Press made the frame. It is the arrest. It is not a news conference. This desk is not naming the man.