Midterm elections live updates: Federal appeals court rejects DOJ appeal in California ballots case

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected an appeal Friday from the Trump administration seeking an emergency order for California to set aside 20,000 ballots belonging to individuals the Justice Department claims belong to "likely" noncitizens.

In a 2-1 ruling, Circuit Judges Mark Bennett, a President Donald Trump appointee, and Gabriel Sanchez, a President Joe Biden appointee, said the Justice Department failed to meet its burden that an emergency injunction was warranted and not counter to the Constitution's Elections Clause, which mandates states take the lead in administering their elections.

"If the United States believes different procedures are necessary for vote-by-mail ballots, we believe it should take that suggestion to Congress, not the courts," the majority judges wrote.

Another Trump appointee on the court, Circuit Judge Patrick Bumatay, dissented from the decision describing the Trump administration's demands to set aside the ballots as "reasonable" given the potential risk of non-citizens casting ballots.

-ABC News' Alexander Mallin

Voters in six states on Nov. 3 will decide whether to approve ballot measures that would amend their state constitutions or state law to make U.S. citizenship a requirement for voting.

The closely watched popular referenda reflect a push by President Donald Trump to crackdown on noncitizen voting based on unsubstantiated claims of widespread voter fraud.

Voting-rights advocates warn they also raise the potential of sidelining millions of eligible American voters.

"Rather than strengthening democracy, [the amendments are] a political maneuver designed to justify future rollbacks of voting rights," said Rashane Hamby with the ACLU of Kansas in testimony last year.

Read more.

-ABC News' Devin Dwyer

Ranked choice voting (RCV) will be used in the congressional and state races in Maine and Alaska again this year. People in those states will have the opportunity to have their ballot count toward the person with the majority of votes, even if they strongly prefer a third party candidate.

Under RCV rules, voters rank their candidates in order of preference, first, second third, etc. If no candidate gets a majority of No. 1 rankings, votes are transferred from the candidate with the least top rankings to the other candidates based on who was ranked second, third and so on.

Read more about how RCV works -- and see an animated graphic explaining it, too.

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz issued a stark warning for his fellow Republicans during his latest episode of his podcast "Verdict," which dropped Friday.

"We could lose Texas. And by the way, not just the Senate race, we could lose every single statewide race in Texas. That's how close these numbers are," Cruz said.

The senator, who had one of the closest Senate elections in Texas history when he beat Democratic candidate Beto O'Rourke by 2.6% in 2018, said that he has "examined a lot of numbers," when it comes to the latest polling.

"The Democrats are massively out-turning out the Republicans," he said.

-ABC News' Diana Paulsen