Blanche announces charges against 10 permanent residents accused of Minnesota voter fraud
Attorney General Todd Blanche announced Wednesday that a federal grand jury had indicted ten lawful permanent residents accused of voting illegally or attempting to do so in multiple Minnesota elections, including the state’s August 2026 primary.
The ten defendants, originally from Liberia, Canada, South Africa, Brazil, Bosnia, Germany, Ghana and Lithuania, allegedly lied to election officials and told them they were U.S. citizens so they could register to vote.
They were accused of voting in the 2022 and 2024 general elections, according to court records.
"Voter fraud erodes the public's trust in our electoral system, and it's vital to our democratic process that we do everything that we can to restore that trust," Blanche said at a news conference announcing the charges.
"The most basic way the Department of Justice can accomplish this restoration of trust is by working to make sure the only people voting in an election in the United States are American citizens who are eligible to vote."
The 10 defendants were charged separately. They are Bhator Konah Bryant, 61, of Liberia; Edvile Vaidoto Edmunds, 59, of Lithuania; Joshua Frederick Kofi Edzie, 63, of Ghana; Alan Barbu Kargbo, 48, of Liberia; Paul Kras, 78, of Germany; Fadil Rasim Ozegovic, 58, of Bosnia; Aparecido Donizetti Padovan, 62, of Brazil; Chris Adam Pettiquoi, 43, of Liberia; Christian Liam Schenk, 47, of Canada; and Hester Sophia Weihmann, 69, of South Africa.
Bryant appears to be the only defendant who wasn't charged with voting illegally, only falsely claiming citizenship in 2024 to register.
Making a false citizenship claim to vote is a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine, while voting by a noncitizen is a misdemeanor punishable by up to one year in prison and a $100,000 fine.
Blanche also expressed frustration that the media has, in his view, not taken the Justice Department's work prosecuting election fraud cases seriously to this point.
"I don't know what the number is that will work for you guys. Whether it's 106, maybe it's 120," he said, referring to a hypothetical number of investigations. "At some point, it has to become meaningful to to the media."
Blanche said since President Donald Trump has returned to office, the Justice Department has charged more than 90 people with voter fraud offenses, including 50 illegal immigrants in the past five weeks.
Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin said there have been 10 voter fraud-related convictions and that there are more than 1,600 active investigations into similar conduct across the country.
Mullin did not answer a reporter’s question about how the department plans to use the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements database, known as SAVE, to identify voters who may be ineligible ahead of the midterms.
STATE DEPARTMENT CONSIDERS SHARING PASSPORT RECORDS FOR VOTER CITIZENSHIP CHECKS
The Supreme Court ruled Friday that the administration may use the database for voter-eligibility checks while litigation continues. SAVE has historically been used to help government agencies verify whether noncitizens applying for public benefits are eligible to receive them.
States’ use of the SAVE database is voluntary, but federal law generally bars states from conducting systematic voter-roll purges within 90 days of a federal election. With the midterms less than a month away, the Supreme Court’s ruling is expected to have limited immediate impact.
During the same news conference Wednesday, Blanche also announced that the Justice Department had filed a judicial misconduct complaint with the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals against several Minnesota federal judges who spoke with The New York Times about cases the department said were still pending.
The article, published Sept. 17, centered on an interview with Judge Patrick J. Schiltz, who said Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) violated nearly 100 orders from the federal district court in Minnesota during the height of Operation Metro Surge, which saw hundreds of federal agents in the streets of Minneapolis throughout January of this year.
Schiltz, a George W. Bush appointee, told the Times that the alleged violation of these orders likely came down to incompetence and staffing shortages at the Justice Department.
Blanche said Schiltz airing various complaints about the Trump administration to the Times was a violation of judicial canons and his ethical duties.
"We have asked the 8th Circuit to conduct an investigation, and in the meantime, we ask that these judges recuse themselves from every case involving DHS, either criminal or civil in nature, because of the obvious bias they have shown in this article," Blanche said.
Shiltz issued this response to Fox News, "As legal ethics experts have confirmed, I was acting well within the ethical rules that apply to federal judges in speaking to The New York Times. Indeed, in February of this year, the Committee on Codes of Conduct issued an advisory opinion to emphasize that federal judges may ‘speak[] and writ[e] on core judiciary matters such as advocacy for the rule of law and judicial independence.’ That is exactly what I did."