JUST IN: A federal appeals court declined to intervene in the Trump administration’s lawsuit against California. The DOJ wanted to set aside 20,000 mail-in ballots from individuals it suspects are noncitizens. The DOJ filed an emergency application last week to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, asking it to block California from counting the ballots. But a three-judge panel handed down a 2–1 decision, citing lack of jurisdiction to rule on the matter because a lower district court had not yet issued its ruling. The federal appeals court dismissed the DOJ’s emergency motion and remanded the matter back to the lower court, which is scheduled to hold a hearing on Oct. 27. Furthermore, granting the Trump administration’s request would pull election administrators away from their existing tasks to implement a new voter-citizenship verification process to align with the DOJ’s demands, the majority of the judges wrote.

BREAKING: President Donald Trump said that he would provide $1 million to people who can report any instances of voter fraud that lead to an arrest or conviction. “Anybody reporting Voter Fraud in the past Elections, or the upcoming 2026 Midterm Election, will be paid $1,000,000 upon the arrest and conviction of those that created the Fraud!” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post. “I’m also going to be issuing a million dollar bonus or reward or whatever you want to call it for anybody that reports voter fraud, leading to the arrest and conviction of somebody,” Trump told reporters on Monday. “We’re giving that person a million dollars.”