Non-Citizens Charged with Voting in Swing State Election

Five non-citizens have been charged after allegedly casting ballots in Michigan’s 2024 general election, state Attorney General Dana Nessel announced Thursday. The cases involve multiple forms of alleged election misconduct, including fraudulent registration, false statements, election forgery, perjury, and voting as an unqualified elector. A United States citizen was also charged after allegedly registering her non-citizen husband to vote.

The cases emerged from a wider review of suspected non-citizen voting conducted by the Michigan Department of State and the attorney general’s office. State officials referred 16 cases involving the November 2024 election during 2025, followed by another 22 cases involving elections held between 2009 and 2025. Six cases have resulted in criminal charges, ten were closed without charges, and the remaining 22 are still under review.

One defendant, 39-year-old Michael Akioya of Oak Park, is a lawful permanent resident who is not an American citizen. Prosecutors allege that Akioya registered using an Inkster address in 2016 and cast an absentee ballot in the 2024 general election, attesting that he was a citizen on both his application and ballot envelope. He faces two misdemeanor counts for allegedly making false statements on absentee-ballot documents and is scheduled to return to court for pretrial on August 25th.

Alondra Harker, a 26-year-old limited-term alien resident from Three Rivers, allegedly registered and voted in person during the same election. She has been charged with fraudulent registration, a 90-day misdemeanor, and is due back in court on September 10th. As Trending Politics reported, every non-citizen charged in these cases allegedly cast a ballot.

Harumi Michael, 60, of Wolverine Lake, is a lawful permanent resident accused of registering in 2024 and voting in person in Commerce Township. According to the Michigan attorney general’s announcement, she faces two five-year felony counts of election-law forgery, a four-year felony count of attempting to vote as an unqualified elector, and one misdemeanor count of making a false statement on a voter registration. Her case has been transferred to Oakland County Circuit Court, where a pretrial conference is scheduled for August 27th.

Robert Piva, a 67-year-old lawful permanent resident from Roseville, allegedly registered online in September 2024 before voting at an early-voting location the following month. Prosecutors said Piva claimed that he cast the ballot as an “experiment concerning voter fraud.” He is charged with election-law perjury, attempting to vote as an unqualified elector, and fraudulent registration. The felony charges carry potential sentences of four or five years in prison.

The fifth non-citizen defendant, 29-year-old Basanth Sadasivian, currently resides in the United Kingdom. Authorities allege that Sadasivian used a Bloomfield Hills address to register through the Federal Post Card Application system and then voted through that same system in the 2024 election. He faces one four-year felony count of attempting to vote as an unqualified elector. State officials did not announce a court date for Sadasivian.

The American citizen charged in the investigation is 60-year-old Kimberley DiDonato of Rose Township. Prosecutors allege that DiDonato posed as her lawful-permanent-resident husband, submitted his identifying information, falsely claimed that he was an American citizen, and registered him online in April 2024. DiDonato later contacted her local clerk and canceled the registration after a voter card arrived in her husband’s name. She reportedly told investigators that she was testing the system for vulnerabilities, but prosecutors charged her with election forgery and using a computer to commit a crime, felonies carrying possible sentences of five and seven years.

“In my office, we’ve always taken election crimes seriously, and prosecute attacks on our voting systems to the fullest extent of the law,” Nessel said. “We’re upholding election integrity by investigating all claims of non-citizen voters, as rare as they are, and holding bad actors accountable when they refuse to abide by the laws that keep our elections safe and secure.” She added, “These charges reflect the severity of the allegations, the sanctity of our democracy, and the tremendous consequences of voting illegally—whether that’s done to try and ‘test’ security measures or to make an unlawful vote count.”

Investigators declined to charge several other individuals after concluding that they could not prove the voters knew they were ineligible or determining that government conduct could support an entrapment defense. Those cases included a lawful permanent resident who voted four times between 2010 and 2024, another who voted eight times since 2011, and an Oak Park woman who voted in eight elections between 2021 and 2024. Michigan officials said the registrations connected to every identified non-citizen voter have now been canceled, while the attorney general’s review of 22 additional cases remains underway.