TAMPA, Fla. — A Mexican national who lived illegally in the United States for decades has been sentenced to four months in federal prison after pleading guilty to passport fraud and making false statements in a passport application.
Juan Arturo Martinez, 62, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Steven D. Merryday after admitting in February 2025 to using a fraudulent identity to obtain U.S. passports and engage in activities reserved for U.S. citizens—including voting in presidential elections.
Court records show that Martinez, who was born in Mexico, submitted a fraudulent passport application in Sarasota on March 1, 2002. To support the application, he provided a fake Texas birth certificate, falsely claiming U.S. citizenship. Based on that application, a passport was issued to him later that month.
In 2012, Martinez mailed a renewal application using the expired passport and again falsely stated he was born in Mission, Texas. That fraudulent information led to the issuance of a second passport, which he used as identification to obtain a Florida driver’s license in 2013. He also used the passport multiple times for travel, including a cruise from Port Canaveral in September 2021.
Martinez submitted another renewal application in 2022, once again falsely listing a U.S. birthplace.
Investigators with the U.S. Department of State also found that Martinez illegally registered to vote and cast ballots in multiple U.S. presidential elections, despite having no legal right to do so.
The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Karyna Valdes.
Federal Voter Fraud Charges Since the 2024 Election
Since the November 2024 U.S. presidential election, only a handful of voter fraud prosecutions related to that election cycle have surfaced. Notably, in April 2025, two Ukrainian nationals were charged for illegal early voting in the 2024 presidential election in Palm Beach County, Florida. Svitlana Demydenko and her daughter Yelyzaveta—neither possessing U.S. citizenship—registered and voted unlawfully during early voting. Those charges were announced by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida.
Beyond that, federal authorities have initiated investigations—often with new cross-departmental structures like DOGE and the DOJ’s refocused voting section—but as of now, only a few indictments or formal charges tied to actual voting wrongdoing have been reported
