““He caught a massive number of Illegal Votes, 20,000, but potentially Hundreds of Thousands, and maybe even Millions, and the Court has just ruled against it.” — President Donald Trump on Truth Social, about First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli, Oct. 31, 2026”

The claim: ““He caught a massive number of Illegal Votes, 20,000, but potentially Hundreds of Thousands, and maybe even Millions, and the Court has just ruled against it.” — President Donald Trump on Truth Social, about First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli, Oct. 31, 2026”

Why we rated it this way: The Ninth Circuit's order lays out the government's own case: federal agencies built a list of more than 20,000 registered voters they labeled “likely” noncitizens, and the government asked California to set aside those people's mail ballots so their citizenship could be checked before counting. That's a list of names flagged for review, not 20,000 votes shown to be illegal, and the filings don't say any of them has been confirmed as a noncitizen voter. U.S. District Judge David O. Carter then denied the request on Oct. 28, writing that he couldn't conclude the government's process was credible, so the court ruled against setting the ballots aside, not against fixing proven fraud.

What would change our rating: Court records or official findings showing that a substantial number of people on the list are confirmed noncitizens who cast ballots would move this toward Missing context or Matches record.