California officials on Monday announced that they would deploy their own observers to watch over federal election monitors the Trump administration is sending to the state for next week’s election.
“They’re not going to be allowed to interfere in ways that the law prohibits,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said during a virtual news conference. “We cannot be naive. The Republican Party asked for the U.S. DOJ to come in.”
Bonta’s comments come after Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Friday that the Department of Justice would monitor polling places during next week’s off-year elections in California and New Jersey to uphold “the highest standards of election integrity.”