West Virginia was among the states sent a warning by the U.S. Department of Justice that officials could face criminal prosecution if noncitizens vote.
The West Virginia Secretary of State’s Office, which is in a federal lawsuit about turning over personal voter information to the federal government, received the letter Tuesday from Harmeet Dhillon, the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division chief.
Dhillon served as co-chair of the “Lawyers for Trump” coalition during the 2020 election cycle, making media appearances to promote the campaign’s fraud claims and calling on the Supreme Court to intervene in the results.
She was confirmed as the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights at the Department of Justice in 2025.
Before Dillon was confirmed, former West Virginia Secretary of State Mac Warner was the acting chief of DOJ’s Civil Rights Division. Mac Warner is the brother of his successor in the state office, the current West Virginia Secretary of State Kris Warner.
Dhillon has directed sweeping, nationwide DOJ Voting Section efforts to audit voter rolls. Her West Virginia letter was addressed to Kris Warner.
“In addition to the Civil Rights Division’s authority to seek injunctive relief for violations of these laws, we are also authorized to prosecute criminal violations,” Dhillon wrote.
Other states also received such letters warning that election officials could face criminal prosecution if votes are cast by noncitizens, and ordering them to do more to purge their voter rolls.
“Got another love letter this morning from the DOJ sprinkled throughout with threats of criminal prosecution,” Utah’s top election official, Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson, posted on social media. Henderson, a Republican, called the letter from DOJ “truly bizarre behavior.”
The letters, including West Virginia’s, demand that states explain within five days how they plan to comply with federal voter eligibility laws.
The letters cite several statutes, including the National Voter Registration Act and the Help America Vote Act, to emphasize that state officials are legally required to maintain accurate voter lists, specifically by identifying and removing noncitizens and ineligible individuals from registration rolls.
“Federal law mandates that state and local election officials properly maintain election records and undertake certain actions to ensure that only eligible U.S. citizens cast votes in elections for federal office,” Dhillon wrote.
The letter made reference to the State Voter Registration List.
“In conclusion, any election officer, including the chief election officer of the state, who knowingly retains noncitizens on the state’s SVRL or facilitates noncitizens in receiving and casting ballots could be subject to criminal liability,” Dhillon wrote.
The letter is addressed to West Virginia’s Secretary of State, but it also is referenced to the West Virginia Attorney General’s Office.
The U.S. Department of Justice and the state of West Virginia are in an ongoing federal legal showdown about state election records.
The Justice Department is demanding unredacted voter data from at least 47 states, including West Virginia.
The requested information includes full names, residential addresses, dates of birth, driver’s license numbers and partial Social Security numbers. The DOJ maintains the request is to verify compliance with the National Voter Registration Act.
West Virginia’s Attorney General, representing the Secretary of State, has asked U.S. District Judge Thomas Johnston to dismiss the DOJ’s demands. The state argues that the request is legally deficient and that the voter list is a protected, internally created database that is exempt from federal production requirements.
As in the other states, lawyers for West Virginia argue the U.S. Department of Justice request is legally deficient because it lacks a specific factual basis and pursues a pretextual purpose related to immigration enforcement rather than voting rights.
So far, federal district courts have dismissed the Justice Department’s suits on the merits in states including California, Oregon, Michigan, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Arizona, Maine, Wisconsin, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New Hampshire.