A 30-year-old Honduran national living in the San Fernando Valley was arrested outside a Ventura health-care facility on federal charges accusing him of falsely registering to vote using his driver’s license as identification. Darwin Jonathan Rivera Flores now faces two felony charges tied to claiming U.S. citizenship on a voter registration form, with prosecutors saying he faces up to five years in federal prison on each count.
According to a statement from the United States Department of Justice, Rivera Flores was charged in federal court in downtown Los Angeles following an investigation by Homeland Security Investigations, with the case prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael G. Wheat. Homeland security agents arrested him Friday, and he is expected to appear in federal court that afternoon, according to reporting from the New York Post. Law enforcement says it obtained a voter registration application bearing Rivera Flores’s signature along with a voter registration receipt, and investigators discovered an online voter registration record under the name Darwin Rivera tied to his Winnetka address.
A Green Card Holder Who Never Sought Citizenship
Per the Post’s reporting, Rivera Flores entered the United States in 2002 and is a lawful permanent resident with no record of ever seeking or obtaining U.S. citizenship. He checked the application box stating he was a U.S. citizen, the outlet reports, and in April told someone he would vote in the upcoming midterm elections — though he has not actually voted in any election.
The case has a separate legal thread running through it. In February, Rivera Flores pleaded guilty to physically disrupting immigration law enforcement operations at a federal building and received a year of probation, and the Post notes he attended an anti-ICE protest in Camarillo that same month. He also allegedly sent text messages insulting and cursing at a federal agent in April, according to the same account.
Federal Prosecutors Frame It as the Start of a Crackdown
Bilal “Bill” Essayli, the U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California since being sworn in in April 2025, said Rivera Flores faces deportation upon conviction and called the arrest “the first of many to come,” per the Post’s reporting. Essayli, who leads the federal district covering seven Southern California counties, said California’s voter registration laws invite fraud by allowing people to register without identification, and argued the state allowed Rivera Flores to remain an active registered voter despite knowing he was not a citizen…