Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach dropped a bombshell Wednesday, announcing election fraud charges against Coldwater Mayor Jose (Joe) Ceballos, just one day after voters handed him another term in office.Ceballos, 54, was charged in Comanche County with three counts of voting without being qualified and three counts of election perjury, non-person felonies that could land him behind bars for more than five years.
“In large part, our system right now is based on trust. Trust that when the person signed the registration or signs the pollbooks saying that he’s a qualified elector or that he is a United States citizen, that the person is telling the truth,” Kobach said. “In this case, we allege that Mr. Ceballos violated that trust.”
Kobach said Ceballos is a legal permanent resident but not a U.S. citizen — calling him a citizen of Mexico who never should have been voting in American elections, let alone leading a Kansas town.
Jose Ceballos. (Coldwater, Kansas)
Kansas Secretary of State Scott Schwab said new tools from the Trump administration helped uncover the alleged fraud. “We now have tools, thanks to the current White House, that we haven’t had in over 10 years,” Schwab said. “That we can check through the SAVE program, to find out if folks end up on our voter rolls. And they could be a legal resident, but they’re not a citizen. We want to make sure that gets clarified.”
The SAVE program — run by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services under the Department of Homeland Security — lets government agencies verify immigration and citizenship status for things like licenses or voter rolls.
Locals expressed frustration, accusing state leadership of misleading them — including Republican gubernatorial candidate Philip Sarnecki, who shared his reaction on X.
Kansas is one of eight states requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote, a law Kobach helped pioneer years ago.
In Coldwater, city leaders scrambled to contain the fallout. City Council President Britt Lenertz said Ceballos called an emergency meeting on Wednesday to address the charges
“At this time, our focus remains on ensuring that city operations continue to run smoothly and that the needs of our community are met,” Lenertz said. “While the recent allegations involving the mayor are understandably concerning, we will allow the proper legal process to take its course before making any further comments. It’s important that we respect both due process and the integrity of our local government.”
Coldwater officials later confirmed Ceballos would need to prove his citizenship to keep his seat. City Attorney Skip Herd said Ceballos is a green card holder who’s been registered to vote since 1990 — despite never being a U.S. citizen.
“He’s been a registered voter since 1990. He applied for citizenship in February of this year, and through that, raised the issue of whether he was a legal citizen,” Herd said.
Under Kansas law, candidates for city office must be eligible voters and residents, though home rule gives cities some leeway. But as the case unfolds, the small Kansas town finds itself at the center of a national flashpoint over election integrity.
Attorney General Pam Bondi obliterated Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin over the Jeffrey Epstein files.
During a Senate Judiciary Hearing on Tuesday, Tennessee Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn was brought up because she has pushed for the release of Epstein files in the past.
Bondi and Blackburn asserted that Durbin was impeding the effort, but Durbin refuted this, despite records indicating he had indeed blocked the release.
Blackburn and Bondi tag-teamed Durbin after he denied a subpoena for the flight logs and knowing Reid Hoffman, a known Epstein affiliate.
“I find it very interesting that you refused repeated Republican requests to release the Epstein flight log in 2023 and 2024, you fought that. Did you take money from Reid Hoffman campaign donations?” Bondi said
Durbin denied taking donations from Hoffman, but Hoffman has given millions to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), which supports Durbin as a top Senate Democrat.
Bondi shot back: “Why did you fight to not disclose the flight logs, Senator Durbin?”
Durbin falsely claimed that he “did not” fight against” Blackburn’s subpoena, adding, “I asked you if you wanted any documents like flight logs to put it in writing. You never did.”
Blackburn shot back: “Yes, sir, I did. And your staff knows that I did. We’ll submit once again, the information to you. We’ve done that several times, but we’ll be happy to once again send it to you. I think your staff doesn’t show that to you.”Bondi made it clear with her opening statement that she planned to correct many lies from Democrats in recent weeks.
“They are a critical reminder of our central mission here at the Department of Justice protecting the safety and security of the American people. That is why, even when the government is otherwise shut down because of the Democrats, the department’s law enforcement officers and prosecutors are hard at work, fighting crime, keeping our streets safe and protecting you from the threats, foreign and domestic. When I was confirmed as the 80 seventh attorney general of the United States, I took office with to mangles to in the weapon, is nation of justice and return the department to it’s core mission of fighting violent crime as to ending the weapon possession of justice. We learn that former FBI secretly investigated you and your colleagues why they wanted to take president,” Bondi began.
“Trump off the playing field. They were playing politics with law enforcement powers and will go down as a historic. The trail of public trust, this is the kind of conduct that shatters the American people’s faith in our law enforcement system. We will work to earn that back every single day,” she added.
“We are returning to our core mission of fighting real crime. While there is more work to do, I believe in eight short months we have made tremendous progress towards those ends. Our federal surges in Washington D.C. in memphis are a perfect example of how the Department of Justice should operate week created strong partnerships with local leadership working hand in hand with both cities to send resources where they were needed. Most, the results speak for themselves,” she added.“Despite the unprecedented degree of activism we’ve seen from the lower courts, we have never ignored a court order and why would we we have secured a historic 20 two victories at the Supreme Court alone with more to come,. Our civil rights attorneys are fighting discrimination and anti Semitism. Our criminal attorneys are prosecuting violent criminals and foreign terrorist every single day. I look forward to continuing this work at the Department of Justice and I look forward to testifying before you today,” Bondi added.