WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump's administration appealed to the Supreme Court on Monday in its push to sideline thousands of disputed California mail ballots the day before the pivotal midterm elections.

The emergency appeal came after a divided appeals court rejected the request to set aside some 20,000 ballots from people the federal government suspects may not be citizens.

The federal government says those ballots should not be counted until the voters’ status can be verified. California officials say the list is highly unreliable and likely includes many people who are U.S. citizens.

The Republican Trump administration has prioritized identifying noncitizen voters this year, despite them being rare.

A district court judge forcefully denied the Justice Department's request and warned that the demand could disenfranchise citizens in Tuesday's midterm elections to determine control of Congress.

The Justice Department asked the high court for a “limited injunction” that would direct California to set aside the ballots while the case plays out.

“Once California commingles the challenged ballots with lawful ones, there is no way to get the challenged ballots back,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote.

Voting has been underway in California, a largely Democratic state, since early October. All of the state’s roughly 23 million registered voters are mailed a ballot. Hundreds of thousands of ballots have already been processed. California election officials have said that finding and setting aside the challenged ballots now would be logistically impossible.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta, a Democrat, said the appeal “reeks of desperation and is another attempt to undermine our elections and trample on the rule of law.”

Lower courts have sided with the state, with a district judge warning that segregating ballots would “wreak havoc” on the midterm elections and erode trust in the democratic process.

“If the Executive can discount votes and threaten an ongoing election due to unproven allegations, then our democracy is in danger,” wrote U.S. District Judge David O. Carter, who was nominated by President Bill Clinton, a Democrat.

A 2-1 appeals court panel upheld his order, with one judge appointed by Trump and another appointed by President Joe Biden, a Democrat, voting in favor. The third judge on the panel, also appointed by Trump, argued in a dissent that California’s unwillingness to separate the ballots encourages the “violation of federal law.”

The Justice Department has sought to move the case along quickly, unsuccessfully asking an appeals court to intervene early.

Trump's administration has racked up a series of wins in emergency appeals before the Supreme Court in his second term, but the justices previously rejected the president’s push to restrict mail ballots ahead of the midterms.

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Associated Press writer Sophie Austin in Sacramento contributed to this report.

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