Trump offers $1m voter fraud reward as DOJ challenges states before midterms

US President Donald Trump has announced a $1m reward for reports of voter fraud, as his administration takes a series of legal steps against states ahead of the midterm elections on 3 November. According to The Guardian, he said the payment would depend on the arrest and conviction of those responsible, and he did not say how the rewards would be funded. The offer follows his repeated claims of widespread voter fraud, which the Guardian described as unfounded.

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Trump was asked whether he would accept the outcome if his Republican Party lost control of Congress. He replied that he would if the elections were "honest", according to Al Jazeera.

On Monday the Justice Department asked Washington state to set aside ballots from more than 400 people it alleges are registered to vote without US citizenship. Its letter gave the state until noon local time on Wednesday to respond or face what the department called "emergency relief". The Guardian said it was the third time this month the department had directly challenged a state while voting was under way.

Washington Secretary of State Steve Hobbs said the timing, one week before the general election, was intended to cast unfounded suspicion on the results. His office said it was reviewing the list but had already found some entries relied on outdated information, including a record from 1994. Hobbs said noncitizen voting is incredibly rare and that every voter signs a declaration of eligibility on the ballot return envelope. Last month, Washington won a case arguing it did not have to hand its full voter list to the Justice Department.

In California, a federal appeals court rejected the administration's attempt to stop the state counting the ballots of 20,000 registered voters the department says are noncitizens. California authorities earlier said many people on the list appeared to have been born in the US, which would make them eligible voters.

Last week the department also sued Alaska, saying it would seek to block certification of the Senate election if Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan did not win. It argued that allowing a second candidate named Dan Sullivan on the ballot meant local authorities were failing to run a fair election. Trump said on Friday that he personally told the department to file the case.

The department also plans to send a record number of election observers on 3 November, despite objections from local officials in Democratic-led states including New Jersey and California. Al Jazeera noted that observers have historically gone to places with records of civil rights violations. Bipartisan voting rights groups have repeatedly dismissed the claim that large numbers of noncitizens vote.