WASHINGTON — President Trump and his allies escalated attacks on U.S. elections on Friday, after the president’s prime-time effort to convince Americans that that the nation’s voting systems are fundamentally flawed, and threatened to punish California and other Democratic states that refuse the administration’s demands for voter data.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened local election officials with fines and prison if they don’t turn over voter rolls to federal officials seeking to root out purported illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Try us,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on X in response to Mullin’s threats. He added that “California has free, fair, and secure elections” and that the state “will fight for them.”
The administration’s threats — made less than four months before the November midterm elections — are a continuation of an aggressive Trump-led campaign to use the federal government to attempt to overhaul the nation’s voting systems and sow public mistrust in elections.
The administration has tried for months to compel Democrat-led states into handing over sensitive voter data to the federal government, but the efforts have run into resistance in courts, in part out of concern for privacy laws. The courts have also reaffirmed in many cases that the Constitution gives states — not the federal government — primary authority over elections.
On Friday, Mullin said his agency has found “as many as” 190,832 possible non-citizens registered to vote in California, along with more in three other Democratic-led states. He said Homeland Security arrived at those numbers by checking the four states’ public voter records.
He vowed to withhold federal election security grants from states until they agree to the administration’s demands, including having their voter registration lists “scrubbed” and their election security systems updated.
“If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they are going to have to implement security measures,” Mullin said at a news conference. “We need to make sure that individuals who are legally able to vote are voting.”
Newsom said the state had “no idea” where that claim came from. The administration has not made its methodology public, and the system Mullin’s department has used to check for non-citizens in the past has inaccurately flagged some citizens as non-citizens. Past election reviews have found non-citizen voting is rare.
“There is plenty of reason to be suspicious of the claims from the administration,” said Brendan Fisher, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center, “and every reason for voters to have confidence in our elections.”
Mullin’s remarks came the day after Trump delivered a prime-time address about vulnerabilities in the election system, claims that largely were not backed up by the evidence he provided. The White House released a trove of declassified documents that fell short of showing that any American election had been affected by fraud or foreign interference.
The White House dug in on the strategy Friday morning, deploying agency heads to continue amplifying the idea of election vulnerabilities, even after fact-checks showed most of his claims were exaggerated and had been previously known, investigated or debunked.
“SAVE OUR ELECTIONS,” the White House said on X.
Trump also used his address to pressure Congress to pass legislation that would tighten voting restrictions and could make it harder for millions to register to vote and cast ballots. While hardline Republicans applauded him, others in the party have rebuffed his request.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Friday that he did not understand why Trump is focusing on a past election when Republicans should focus on what is ahead.
“I think historically the midterms for the party in power are really tough,” Cornyn said. “So, yeah, I am concerned about it. We ought to be talking about things looking forward that our constituents are most concerned about.”
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the nation’s electoral systems are safe, and while he thinks election officials need to be “vigilant,” he said he is more concerned about economic issues ahead of the midterms..
Discussing the legislation ahead of the speech Thursday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said it would be “impossible” to carry out changes to the nation’s voting laws in time for the midterms.
“The only thing that will occur is an undermining of the integrity of our elections right now,” Tillis said on the Senate floor.
David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, called Mullin’s threats “laughable.”
“There is no significant pool of federal grant money appropriated, so this threat has no teeth for any state. None of them are expecting any significant federal funds for elections,” Becker said.
Mullin told reporters Friday the federal government plans to use public records requests to try to obtain the voter roll information in order to investigate whether non-citizens have voted. Any member of the public can make a public records request; the move signals that the government has few remaining avenues to force the state to turn over voter data.
But Mullin appeared to acknowledge the limitations, saying: “I obviously can’t force the states.” He later threatened to levy fines, penalties or criminal charges against elections officials in states that don’t comply with the government’s demand.
If their behavior wasn’t criminal, Mullin said he would make sure state and county officials — who do not work for the federal government — would “never work for the federal government again.”
More than a dozen courts have ruled against the Justice Department’s highly unusual demand for state voter rolls. The federal government is not entitled to the data under federal law, Becker said.
He said previous government investigations into non-citizen voting have found that most people flagged against DHS’ database were either citizens or non-citizens who had never registered themselves to vote.
The Trump administration has used a database from an immigration verification system to flag possible non-citizen voters, but election officials have found that method misidentified some voters. Even with citizens mistakenly included in the count, the number of possible ineligible voters was extremely low — in Texas, 0.0001% of voters.
Data indicate that voting by non-citizens is rare. A study of the 2016 election by the Brennan Center for Justice found that officials referred about 30 cases of suspected non-citizen voting for investigation or prosecution. A 2024 review by the American Immigration Council of the right-wing Heritage Foundation‘s database turned up 68 cases of noncitizen voting since the 1980s.
While Trump’s speech prompted warnings from his critics that he could be laying the groundwork to take further steps to interfere with or tighten restrictions on elections, experts said he was running out of moves.
Becker predicted that Trump would not actually attempt to cancel elections or send officers to the polls and that courts would block the president if he declared a national emergency to exert control over elections.
“But I think there are people in the administration, including the president himself, who would like us all to think this is possible,” he said.
Fisher said Trump may be trying to lay the groundwork to dispute the midterm results if he doesn’t like the outcome, but said his powers to do so are limited.
“There’s safeguards and laws in place to protect the freedom to vote,” Fisher said, “and voters should tune out the noise and continue to participate in our democracy.”
WASHINGTON — President Trump and his allies escalated attacks on U.S. elections on Friday, after the president’s prime-time effort to convince Americans that that the nation’s voting systems are fundamentally flawed, and threatened to punish California and other Democratic states that refuse the administration’s demands for voter data.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened local election officials with fines and prison if they don’t turn over voter rolls to federal officials seeking to root out purported illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Try us,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on X in response to Mullin’s threats. He added that “California has free, fair, and secure elections” and that the state “will fight for them.”
The administration’s threats — made less than four months before the November midterm elections — are a continuation of an aggressive Trump-led campaign to use the federal government to attempt to overhaul the nation’s voting systems and sow public mistrust in elections.
The administration has tried for months to compel Democrat-led states into handing over sensitive voter data to the federal government, but the efforts have run into resistance in courts, in part out of concern for privacy laws. The courts have also reaffirmed in many cases that the Constitution gives states — not the federal government — primary authority over elections.
On Friday, Mullin said his agency has found “as many as” 190,832 possible non-citizens registered to vote in California, along with more in three other Democratic-led states. He said Homeland Security arrived at those numbers by checking the four states’ public voter records.
He vowed to withhold federal election security grants from states until they agree to the administration’s demands, including having their voter registration lists “scrubbed” and their election security systems updated.
“If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they are going to have to implement security measures,” Mullin said at a news conference. “We need to make sure that individuals who are legally able to vote are voting.”
Newsom said the state had “no idea” where that claim came from. The administration has not made its methodology public, and the system Mullin’s department has used to check for non-citizens in the past has inaccurately flagged some citizens as non-citizens. Past election reviews have found non-citizen voting is rare.
“There is plenty of reason to be suspicious of the claims from the administration,” said Brendan Fisher, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center, “and every reason for voters to have confidence in our elections.”
Mullin’s remarks came the day after Trump delivered a prime-time address about vulnerabilities in the election system, claims that largely were not backed up by the evidence he provided. The White House released a trove of declassified documents that fell short of showing that any American election had been affected by fraud or foreign interference.
The White House dug in on the strategy Friday morning, deploying agency heads to continue amplifying the idea of election vulnerabilities, even after fact-checks showed most of his claims were exaggerated and had been previously known, investigated or debunked.
“SAVE OUR ELECTIONS,” the White House said on X.
Trump also used his address to pressure Congress to pass legislation that would tighten voting restrictions and could make it harder for millions to register to vote and cast ballots. While hardline Republicans applauded him, others in the party have rebuffed his request.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Friday that he did not understand why Trump is focusing on a past election when Republicans should focus on what is ahead.
“I think historically the midterms for the party in power are really tough,” Cornyn said. “So, yeah, I am concerned about it. We ought to be talking about things looking forward that our constituents are most concerned about.”
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the nation’s electoral systems are safe, and while he thinks election officials need to be “vigilant,” he said he is more concerned about economic issues ahead of the midterms..
Discussing the legislation ahead of the speech Thursday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said it would be “impossible” to carry out changes to the nation’s voting laws in time for the midterms.
“The only thing that will occur is an undermining of the integrity of our elections right now,” Tillis said on the Senate floor.
David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, called Mullin’s threats “laughable.”
“There is no significant pool of federal grant money appropriated, so this threat has no teeth for any state. None of them are expecting any significant federal funds for elections,” Becker said.
Mullin told reporters Friday the federal government plans to use public records requests to try to obtain the voter roll information in order to investigate whether non-citizens have voted. Any member of the public can make a public records request; the move signals that the government has few remaining avenues to force the state to turn over voter data.
But Mullin appeared to acknowledge the limitations, saying: “I obviously can’t force the states.” He later threatened to levy fines, penalties or criminal charges against elections officials in states that don’t comply with the government’s demand.
If their behavior wasn’t criminal, Mullin said he would make sure state and county officials — who do not work for the federal government — would “never work for the federal government again.”
More than a dozen courts have ruled against the Justice Department’s highly unusual demand for state voter rolls. The federal government is not entitled to the data under federal law, Becker said.
He said previous government investigations into non-citizen voting have found that most people flagged against DHS’ database were either citizens or non-citizens who had never registered themselves to vote.
The Trump administration has used a database from an immigration verification system to flag possible non-citizen voters, but election officials have found that method misidentified some voters. Even with citizens mistakenly included in the count, the number of possible ineligible voters was extremely low — in Texas, 0.0001% of voters.
Data indicate that voting by non-citizens is rare. A study of the 2016 election by the Brennan Center for Justice found that officials referred about 30 cases of suspected non-citizen voting for investigation or prosecution. A 2024 review by the American Immigration Council of the right-wing Heritage Foundation‘s database turned up 68 cases of noncitizen voting since the 1980s.
While Trump’s speech prompted warnings from his critics that he could be laying the groundwork to take further steps to interfere with or tighten restrictions on elections, experts said he was running out of moves.
Becker predicted that Trump would not actually attempt to cancel elections or send officers to the polls and that courts would block the president if he declared a national emergency to exert control over elections.
“But I think there are people in the administration, including the president himself, who would like us all to think this is possible,” he said.
Fisher said Trump may be trying to lay the groundwork to dispute the midterm results if he doesn’t like the outcome, but said his powers to do so are limited.
“There’s safeguards and laws in place to protect the freedom to vote,” Fisher said, “and voters should tune out the noise and continue to participate in our democracy.”
WASHINGTON — President Trump and his allies escalated attacks on U.S. elections on Friday, after the president’s prime-time effort to convince Americans that that the nation’s voting systems are fundamentally flawed, and threatened to punish California and other Democratic states that refuse the administration’s demands for voter data.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened local election officials with fines and prison if they don’t turn over voter rolls to federal officials seeking to root out purported illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Try us,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on X in response to Mullin’s threats. He added that “California has free, fair, and secure elections” and that the state “will fight for them.”
The administration’s threats — made less than four months before the November midterm elections — are a continuation of an aggressive Trump-led campaign to use the federal government to attempt to overhaul the nation’s voting systems and sow public mistrust in elections.
The administration has tried for months to compel Democrat-led states into handing over sensitive voter data to the federal government, but the efforts have run into resistance in courts, in part out of concern for privacy laws. The courts have also reaffirmed in many cases that the Constitution gives states — not the federal government — primary authority over elections.
On Friday, Mullin said his agency has found “as many as” 190,832 possible non-citizens registered to vote in California, along with more in three other Democratic-led states. He said Homeland Security arrived at those numbers by checking the four states’ public voter records.
He vowed to withhold federal election security grants from states until they agree to the administration’s demands, including having their voter registration lists “scrubbed” and their election security systems updated.
“If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they are going to have to implement security measures,” Mullin said at a news conference. “We need to make sure that individuals who are legally able to vote are voting.”
Newsom said the state had “no idea” where that claim came from. The administration has not made its methodology public, and the system Mullin’s department has used to check for non-citizens in the past has inaccurately flagged some citizens as non-citizens. Past election reviews have found non-citizen voting is rare.
“There is plenty of reason to be suspicious of the claims from the administration,” said Brendan Fisher, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center, “and every reason for voters to have confidence in our elections.”
Mullin’s remarks came the day after Trump delivered a prime-time address about vulnerabilities in the election system, claims that largely were not backed up by the evidence he provided. The White House released a trove of declassified documents that fell short of showing that any American election had been affected by fraud or foreign interference.
The White House dug in on the strategy Friday morning, deploying agency heads to continue amplifying the idea of election vulnerabilities, even after fact-checks showed most of his claims were exaggerated and had been previously known, investigated or debunked.
“SAVE OUR ELECTIONS,” the White House said on X.
Trump also used his address to pressure Congress to pass legislation that would tighten voting restrictions and could make it harder for millions to register to vote and cast ballots. While hardline Republicans applauded him, others in the party have rebuffed his request.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Friday that he did not understand why Trump is focusing on a past election when Republicans should focus on what is ahead.
“I think historically the midterms for the party in power are really tough,” Cornyn said. “So, yeah, I am concerned about it. We ought to be talking about things looking forward that our constituents are most concerned about.”
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the nation’s electoral systems are safe, and while he thinks election officials need to be “vigilant,” he said he is more concerned about economic issues ahead of the midterms..
Discussing the legislation ahead of the speech Thursday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said it would be “impossible” to carry out changes to the nation’s voting laws in time for the midterms.
“The only thing that will occur is an undermining of the integrity of our elections right now,” Tillis said on the Senate floor.
David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, called Mullin’s threats “laughable.”
“There is no significant pool of federal grant money appropriated, so this threat has no teeth for any state. None of them are expecting any significant federal funds for elections,” Becker said.
Mullin told reporters Friday the federal government plans to use public records requests to try to obtain the voter roll information in order to investigate whether non-citizens have voted. Any member of the public can make a public records request; the move signals that the government has few remaining avenues to force the state to turn over voter data.
But Mullin appeared to acknowledge the limitations, saying: “I obviously can’t force the states.” He later threatened to levy fines, penalties or criminal charges against elections officials in states that don’t comply with the government’s demand.
If their behavior wasn’t criminal, Mullin said he would make sure state and county officials — who do not work for the federal government — would “never work for the federal government again.”
More than a dozen courts have ruled against the Justice Department’s highly unusual demand for state voter rolls. The federal government is not entitled to the data under federal law, Becker said.
He said previous government investigations into non-citizen voting have found that most people flagged against DHS’ database were either citizens or non-citizens who had never registered themselves to vote.
The Trump administration has used a database from an immigration verification system to flag possible non-citizen voters, but election officials have found that method misidentified some voters. Even with citizens mistakenly included in the count, the number of possible ineligible voters was extremely low — in Texas, 0.0001% of voters.
Data indicate that voting by non-citizens is rare. A study of the 2016 election by the Brennan Center for Justice found that officials referred about 30 cases of suspected non-citizen voting for investigation or prosecution. A 2024 review by the American Immigration Council of the right-wing Heritage Foundation‘s database turned up 68 cases of noncitizen voting since the 1980s.
While Trump’s speech prompted warnings from his critics that he could be laying the groundwork to take further steps to interfere with or tighten restrictions on elections, experts said he was running out of moves.
Becker predicted that Trump would not actually attempt to cancel elections or send officers to the polls and that courts would block the president if he declared a national emergency to exert control over elections.
“But I think there are people in the administration, including the president himself, who would like us all to think this is possible,” he said.
Fisher said Trump may be trying to lay the groundwork to dispute the midterm results if he doesn’t like the outcome, but said his powers to do so are limited.
“There’s safeguards and laws in place to protect the freedom to vote,” Fisher said, “and voters should tune out the noise and continue to participate in our democracy.”
WASHINGTON — President Trump and his allies escalated attacks on U.S. elections on Friday, after the president’s prime-time effort to convince Americans that that the nation’s voting systems are fundamentally flawed, and threatened to punish California and other Democratic states that refuse the administration’s demands for voter data.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened local election officials with fines and prison if they don’t turn over voter rolls to federal officials seeking to root out purported illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Try us,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on X in response to Mullin’s threats. He added that “California has free, fair, and secure elections” and that the state “will fight for them.”
The administration’s threats — made less than four months before the November midterm elections — are a continuation of an aggressive Trump-led campaign to use the federal government to attempt to overhaul the nation’s voting systems and sow public mistrust in elections.
The administration has tried for months to compel Democrat-led states into handing over sensitive voter data to the federal government, but the efforts have run into resistance in courts, in part out of concern for privacy laws. The courts have also reaffirmed in many cases that the Constitution gives states — not the federal government — primary authority over elections.
On Friday, Mullin said his agency has found “as many as” 190,832 possible non-citizens registered to vote in California, along with more in three other Democratic-led states. He said Homeland Security arrived at those numbers by checking the four states’ public voter records.
He vowed to withhold federal election security grants from states until they agree to the administration’s demands, including having their voter registration lists “scrubbed” and their election security systems updated.
“If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they are going to have to implement security measures,” Mullin said at a news conference. “We need to make sure that individuals who are legally able to vote are voting.”
Newsom said the state had “no idea” where that claim came from. The administration has not made its methodology public, and the system Mullin’s department has used to check for non-citizens in the past has inaccurately flagged some citizens as non-citizens. Past election reviews have found non-citizen voting is rare.
“There is plenty of reason to be suspicious of the claims from the administration,” said Brendan Fisher, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center, “and every reason for voters to have confidence in our elections.”
Mullin’s remarks came the day after Trump delivered a prime-time address about vulnerabilities in the election system, claims that largely were not backed up by the evidence he provided. The White House released a trove of declassified documents that fell short of showing that any American election had been affected by fraud or foreign interference.
The White House dug in on the strategy Friday morning, deploying agency heads to continue amplifying the idea of election vulnerabilities, even after fact-checks showed most of his claims were exaggerated and had been previously known, investigated or debunked.
“SAVE OUR ELECTIONS,” the White House said on X.
Trump also used his address to pressure Congress to pass legislation that would tighten voting restrictions and could make it harder for millions to register to vote and cast ballots. While hardline Republicans applauded him, others in the party have rebuffed his request.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Friday that he did not understand why Trump is focusing on a past election when Republicans should focus on what is ahead.
“I think historically the midterms for the party in power are really tough,” Cornyn said. “So, yeah, I am concerned about it. We ought to be talking about things looking forward that our constituents are most concerned about.”
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the nation’s electoral systems are safe, and while he thinks election officials need to be “vigilant,” he said he is more concerned about economic issues ahead of the midterms..
Discussing the legislation ahead of the speech Thursday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said it would be “impossible” to carry out changes to the nation’s voting laws in time for the midterms.
“The only thing that will occur is an undermining of the integrity of our elections right now,” Tillis said on the Senate floor.
David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, called Mullin’s threats “laughable.”
“There is no significant pool of federal grant money appropriated, so this threat has no teeth for any state. None of them are expecting any significant federal funds for elections,” Becker said.
Mullin told reporters Friday the federal government plans to use public records requests to try to obtain the voter roll information in order to investigate whether non-citizens have voted. Any member of the public can make a public records request; the move signals that the government has few remaining avenues to force the state to turn over voter data.
But Mullin appeared to acknowledge the limitations, saying: “I obviously can’t force the states.” He later threatened to levy fines, penalties or criminal charges against elections officials in states that don’t comply with the government’s demand.
If their behavior wasn’t criminal, Mullin said he would make sure state and county officials — who do not work for the federal government — would “never work for the federal government again.”
More than a dozen courts have ruled against the Justice Department’s highly unusual demand for state voter rolls. The federal government is not entitled to the data under federal law, Becker said.
He said previous government investigations into non-citizen voting have found that most people flagged against DHS’ database were either citizens or non-citizens who had never registered themselves to vote.
The Trump administration has used a database from an immigration verification system to flag possible non-citizen voters, but election officials have found that method misidentified some voters. Even with citizens mistakenly included in the count, the number of possible ineligible voters was extremely low — in Texas, 0.0001% of voters.
Data indicate that voting by non-citizens is rare. A study of the 2016 election by the Brennan Center for Justice found that officials referred about 30 cases of suspected non-citizen voting for investigation or prosecution. A 2024 review by the American Immigration Council of the right-wing Heritage Foundation‘s database turned up 68 cases of noncitizen voting since the 1980s.
While Trump’s speech prompted warnings from his critics that he could be laying the groundwork to take further steps to interfere with or tighten restrictions on elections, experts said he was running out of moves.
Becker predicted that Trump would not actually attempt to cancel elections or send officers to the polls and that courts would block the president if he declared a national emergency to exert control over elections.
“But I think there are people in the administration, including the president himself, who would like us all to think this is possible,” he said.
Fisher said Trump may be trying to lay the groundwork to dispute the midterm results if he doesn’t like the outcome, but said his powers to do so are limited.
“There’s safeguards and laws in place to protect the freedom to vote,” Fisher said, “and voters should tune out the noise and continue to participate in our democracy.”
WASHINGTON — President Trump and his allies escalated attacks on U.S. elections on Friday, after the president’s prime-time effort to convince Americans that that the nation’s voting systems are fundamentally flawed, and threatened to punish California and other Democratic states that refuse the administration’s demands for voter data.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened local election officials with fines and prison if they don’t turn over voter rolls to federal officials seeking to root out purported illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Try us,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on X in response to Mullin’s threats. He added that “California has free, fair, and secure elections” and that the state “will fight for them.”
The administration’s threats — made less than four months before the November midterm elections — are a continuation of an aggressive Trump-led campaign to use the federal government to attempt to overhaul the nation’s voting systems and sow public mistrust in elections.
The administration has tried for months to compel Democrat-led states into handing over sensitive voter data to the federal government, but the efforts have run into resistance in courts, in part out of concern for privacy laws. The courts have also reaffirmed in many cases that the Constitution gives states — not the federal government — primary authority over elections.
On Friday, Mullin said his agency has found “as many as” 190,832 possible non-citizens registered to vote in California, along with more in three other Democratic-led states. He said Homeland Security arrived at those numbers by checking the four states’ public voter records.
He vowed to withhold federal election security grants from states until they agree to the administration’s demands, including having their voter registration lists “scrubbed” and their election security systems updated.
“If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they are going to have to implement security measures,” Mullin said at a news conference. “We need to make sure that individuals who are legally able to vote are voting.”
Newsom said the state had “no idea” where that claim came from. The administration has not made its methodology public, and the system Mullin’s department has used to check for non-citizens in the past has inaccurately flagged some citizens as non-citizens. Past election reviews have found non-citizen voting is rare.
“There is plenty of reason to be suspicious of the claims from the administration,” said Brendan Fisher, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center, “and every reason for voters to have confidence in our elections.”
Mullin’s remarks came the day after Trump delivered a prime-time address about vulnerabilities in the election system, claims that largely were not backed up by the evidence he provided. The White House released a trove of declassified documents that fell short of showing that any American election had been affected by fraud or foreign interference.
The White House dug in on the strategy Friday morning, deploying agency heads to continue amplifying the idea of election vulnerabilities, even after fact-checks showed most of his claims were exaggerated and had been previously known, investigated or debunked.
“SAVE OUR ELECTIONS,” the White House said on X.
Trump also used his address to pressure Congress to pass legislation that would tighten voting restrictions and could make it harder for millions to register to vote and cast ballots. While hardline Republicans applauded him, others in the party have rebuffed his request.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Friday that he did not understand why Trump is focusing on a past election when Republicans should focus on what is ahead.
“I think historically the midterms for the party in power are really tough,” Cornyn said. “So, yeah, I am concerned about it. We ought to be talking about things looking forward that our constituents are most concerned about.”
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the nation’s electoral systems are safe, and while he thinks election officials need to be “vigilant,” he said he is more concerned about economic issues ahead of the midterms..
Discussing the legislation ahead of the speech Thursday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said it would be “impossible” to carry out changes to the nation’s voting laws in time for the midterms.
“The only thing that will occur is an undermining of the integrity of our elections right now,” Tillis said on the Senate floor.
David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, called Mullin’s threats “laughable.”
“There is no significant pool of federal grant money appropriated, so this threat has no teeth for any state. None of them are expecting any significant federal funds for elections,” Becker said.
Mullin told reporters Friday the federal government plans to use public records requests to try to obtain the voter roll information in order to investigate whether non-citizens have voted. Any member of the public can make a public records request; the move signals that the government has few remaining avenues to force the state to turn over voter data.
But Mullin appeared to acknowledge the limitations, saying: “I obviously can’t force the states.” He later threatened to levy fines, penalties or criminal charges against elections officials in states that don’t comply with the government’s demand.
If their behavior wasn’t criminal, Mullin said he would make sure state and county officials — who do not work for the federal government — would “never work for the federal government again.”
More than a dozen courts have ruled against the Justice Department’s highly unusual demand for state voter rolls. The federal government is not entitled to the data under federal law, Becker said.
He said previous government investigations into non-citizen voting have found that most people flagged against DHS’ database were either citizens or non-citizens who had never registered themselves to vote.
The Trump administration has used a database from an immigration verification system to flag possible non-citizen voters, but election officials have found that method misidentified some voters. Even with citizens mistakenly included in the count, the number of possible ineligible voters was extremely low — in Texas, 0.0001% of voters.
Data indicate that voting by non-citizens is rare. A study of the 2016 election by the Brennan Center for Justice found that officials referred about 30 cases of suspected non-citizen voting for investigation or prosecution. A 2024 review by the American Immigration Council of the right-wing Heritage Foundation‘s database turned up 68 cases of noncitizen voting since the 1980s.
While Trump’s speech prompted warnings from his critics that he could be laying the groundwork to take further steps to interfere with or tighten restrictions on elections, experts said he was running out of moves.
Becker predicted that Trump would not actually attempt to cancel elections or send officers to the polls and that courts would block the president if he declared a national emergency to exert control over elections.
“But I think there are people in the administration, including the president himself, who would like us all to think this is possible,” he said.
Fisher said Trump may be trying to lay the groundwork to dispute the midterm results if he doesn’t like the outcome, but said his powers to do so are limited.
“There’s safeguards and laws in place to protect the freedom to vote,” Fisher said, “and voters should tune out the noise and continue to participate in our democracy.”
WASHINGTON — President Trump and his allies escalated attacks on U.S. elections on Friday, after the president’s prime-time effort to convince Americans that that the nation’s voting systems are fundamentally flawed, and threatened to punish California and other Democratic states that refuse the administration’s demands for voter data.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened local election officials with fines and prison if they don’t turn over voter rolls to federal officials seeking to root out purported illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Try us,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on X in response to Mullin’s threats. He added that “California has free, fair, and secure elections” and that the state “will fight for them.”
The administration’s threats — made less than four months before the November midterm elections — are a continuation of an aggressive Trump-led campaign to use the federal government to attempt to overhaul the nation’s voting systems and sow public mistrust in elections.
The administration has tried for months to compel Democrat-led states into handing over sensitive voter data to the federal government, but the efforts have run into resistance in courts, in part out of concern for privacy laws. The courts have also reaffirmed in many cases that the Constitution gives states — not the federal government — primary authority over elections.
On Friday, Mullin said his agency has found “as many as” 190,832 possible non-citizens registered to vote in California, along with more in three other Democratic-led states. He said Homeland Security arrived at those numbers by checking the four states’ public voter records.
He vowed to withhold federal election security grants from states until they agree to the administration’s demands, including having their voter registration lists “scrubbed” and their election security systems updated.
“If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they are going to have to implement security measures,” Mullin said at a news conference. “We need to make sure that individuals who are legally able to vote are voting.”
Newsom said the state had “no idea” where that claim came from. The administration has not made its methodology public, and the system Mullin’s department has used to check for non-citizens in the past has inaccurately flagged some citizens as non-citizens. Past election reviews have found non-citizen voting is rare.
“There is plenty of reason to be suspicious of the claims from the administration,” said Brendan Fisher, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center, “and every reason for voters to have confidence in our elections.”
Mullin’s remarks came the day after Trump delivered a prime-time address about vulnerabilities in the election system, claims that largely were not backed up by the evidence he provided. The White House released a trove of declassified documents that fell short of showing that any American election had been affected by fraud or foreign interference.
The White House dug in on the strategy Friday morning, deploying agency heads to continue amplifying the idea of election vulnerabilities, even after fact-checks showed most of his claims were exaggerated and had been previously known, investigated or debunked.
“SAVE OUR ELECTIONS,” the White House said on X.
Trump also used his address to pressure Congress to pass legislation that would tighten voting restrictions and could make it harder for millions to register to vote and cast ballots. While hardline Republicans applauded him, others in the party have rebuffed his request.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Friday that he did not understand why Trump is focusing on a past election when Republicans should focus on what is ahead.
“I think historically the midterms for the party in power are really tough,” Cornyn said. “So, yeah, I am concerned about it. We ought to be talking about things looking forward that our constituents are most concerned about.”
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the nation’s electoral systems are safe, and while he thinks election officials need to be “vigilant,” he said he is more concerned about economic issues ahead of the midterms..
Discussing the legislation ahead of the speech Thursday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said it would be “impossible” to carry out changes to the nation’s voting laws in time for the midterms.
“The only thing that will occur is an undermining of the integrity of our elections right now,” Tillis said on the Senate floor.
David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, called Mullin’s threats “laughable.”
“There is no significant pool of federal grant money appropriated, so this threat has no teeth for any state. None of them are expecting any significant federal funds for elections,” Becker said.
Mullin told reporters Friday the federal government plans to use public records requests to try to obtain the voter roll information in order to investigate whether non-citizens have voted. Any member of the public can make a public records request; the move signals that the government has few remaining avenues to force the state to turn over voter data.
But Mullin appeared to acknowledge the limitations, saying: “I obviously can’t force the states.” He later threatened to levy fines, penalties or criminal charges against elections officials in states that don’t comply with the government’s demand.
If their behavior wasn’t criminal, Mullin said he would make sure state and county officials — who do not work for the federal government — would “never work for the federal government again.”
More than a dozen courts have ruled against the Justice Department’s highly unusual demand for state voter rolls. The federal government is not entitled to the data under federal law, Becker said.
He said previous government investigations into non-citizen voting have found that most people flagged against DHS’ database were either citizens or non-citizens who had never registered themselves to vote.
The Trump administration has used a database from an immigration verification system to flag possible non-citizen voters, but election officials have found that method misidentified some voters. Even with citizens mistakenly included in the count, the number of possible ineligible voters was extremely low — in Texas, 0.0001% of voters.
Data indicate that voting by non-citizens is rare. A study of the 2016 election by the Brennan Center for Justice found that officials referred about 30 cases of suspected non-citizen voting for investigation or prosecution. A 2024 review by the American Immigration Council of the right-wing Heritage Foundation‘s database turned up 68 cases of noncitizen voting since the 1980s.
While Trump’s speech prompted warnings from his critics that he could be laying the groundwork to take further steps to interfere with or tighten restrictions on elections, experts said he was running out of moves.
Becker predicted that Trump would not actually attempt to cancel elections or send officers to the polls and that courts would block the president if he declared a national emergency to exert control over elections.
“But I think there are people in the administration, including the president himself, who would like us all to think this is possible,” he said.
Fisher said Trump may be trying to lay the groundwork to dispute the midterm results if he doesn’t like the outcome, but said his powers to do so are limited.
“There’s safeguards and laws in place to protect the freedom to vote,” Fisher said, “and voters should tune out the noise and continue to participate in our democracy.”
WASHINGTON — President Trump and his allies escalated attacks on U.S. elections on Friday, after the president’s prime-time effort to convince Americans that that the nation’s voting systems are fundamentally flawed, and threatened to punish California and other Democratic states that refuse the administration’s demands for voter data.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened local election officials with fines and prison if they don’t turn over voter rolls to federal officials seeking to root out purported illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Try us,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on X in response to Mullin’s threats. He added that “California has free, fair, and secure elections” and that the state “will fight for them.”
The administration’s threats — made less than four months before the November midterm elections — are a continuation of an aggressive Trump-led campaign to use the federal government to attempt to overhaul the nation’s voting systems and sow public mistrust in elections.
The administration has tried for months to compel Democrat-led states into handing over sensitive voter data to the federal government, but the efforts have run into resistance in courts, in part out of concern for privacy laws. The courts have also reaffirmed in many cases that the Constitution gives states — not the federal government — primary authority over elections.
On Friday, Mullin said his agency has found “as many as” 190,832 possible non-citizens registered to vote in California, along with more in three other Democratic-led states. He said Homeland Security arrived at those numbers by checking the four states’ public voter records.
He vowed to withhold federal election security grants from states until they agree to the administration’s demands, including having their voter registration lists “scrubbed” and their election security systems updated.
“If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they are going to have to implement security measures,” Mullin said at a news conference. “We need to make sure that individuals who are legally able to vote are voting.”
Newsom said the state had “no idea” where that claim came from. The administration has not made its methodology public, and the system Mullin’s department has used to check for non-citizens in the past has inaccurately flagged some citizens as non-citizens. Past election reviews have found non-citizen voting is rare.
“There is plenty of reason to be suspicious of the claims from the administration,” said Brendan Fisher, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center, “and every reason for voters to have confidence in our elections.”
Mullin’s remarks came the day after Trump delivered a prime-time address about vulnerabilities in the election system, claims that largely were not backed up by the evidence he provided. The White House released a trove of declassified documents that fell short of showing that any American election had been affected by fraud or foreign interference.
The White House dug in on the strategy Friday morning, deploying agency heads to continue amplifying the idea of election vulnerabilities, even after fact-checks showed most of his claims were exaggerated and had been previously known, investigated or debunked.
“SAVE OUR ELECTIONS,” the White House said on X.
Trump also used his address to pressure Congress to pass legislation that would tighten voting restrictions and could make it harder for millions to register to vote and cast ballots. While hardline Republicans applauded him, others in the party have rebuffed his request.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Friday that he did not understand why Trump is focusing on a past election when Republicans should focus on what is ahead.
“I think historically the midterms for the party in power are really tough,” Cornyn said. “So, yeah, I am concerned about it. We ought to be talking about things looking forward that our constituents are most concerned about.”
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the nation’s electoral systems are safe, and while he thinks election officials need to be “vigilant,” he said he is more concerned about economic issues ahead of the midterms..
Discussing the legislation ahead of the speech Thursday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said it would be “impossible” to carry out changes to the nation’s voting laws in time for the midterms.
“The only thing that will occur is an undermining of the integrity of our elections right now,” Tillis said on the Senate floor.
David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, called Mullin’s threats “laughable.”
“There is no significant pool of federal grant money appropriated, so this threat has no teeth for any state. None of them are expecting any significant federal funds for elections,” Becker said.
Mullin told reporters Friday the federal government plans to use public records requests to try to obtain the voter roll information in order to investigate whether non-citizens have voted. Any member of the public can make a public records request; the move signals that the government has few remaining avenues to force the state to turn over voter data.
But Mullin appeared to acknowledge the limitations, saying: “I obviously can’t force the states.” He later threatened to levy fines, penalties or criminal charges against elections officials in states that don’t comply with the government’s demand.
If their behavior wasn’t criminal, Mullin said he would make sure state and county officials — who do not work for the federal government — would “never work for the federal government again.”
More than a dozen courts have ruled against the Justice Department’s highly unusual demand for state voter rolls. The federal government is not entitled to the data under federal law, Becker said.
He said previous government investigations into non-citizen voting have found that most people flagged against DHS’ database were either citizens or non-citizens who had never registered themselves to vote.
The Trump administration has used a database from an immigration verification system to flag possible non-citizen voters, but election officials have found that method misidentified some voters. Even with citizens mistakenly included in the count, the number of possible ineligible voters was extremely low — in Texas, 0.0001% of voters.
Data indicate that voting by non-citizens is rare. A study of the 2016 election by the Brennan Center for Justice found that officials referred about 30 cases of suspected non-citizen voting for investigation or prosecution. A 2024 review by the American Immigration Council of the right-wing Heritage Foundation‘s database turned up 68 cases of noncitizen voting since the 1980s.
While Trump’s speech prompted warnings from his critics that he could be laying the groundwork to take further steps to interfere with or tighten restrictions on elections, experts said he was running out of moves.
Becker predicted that Trump would not actually attempt to cancel elections or send officers to the polls and that courts would block the president if he declared a national emergency to exert control over elections.
“But I think there are people in the administration, including the president himself, who would like us all to think this is possible,” he said.
Fisher said Trump may be trying to lay the groundwork to dispute the midterm results if he doesn’t like the outcome, but said his powers to do so are limited.
“There’s safeguards and laws in place to protect the freedom to vote,” Fisher said, “and voters should tune out the noise and continue to participate in our democracy.”
WASHINGTON — President Trump and his allies escalated attacks on U.S. elections on Friday, after the president’s prime-time effort to convince Americans that that the nation’s voting systems are fundamentally flawed, and threatened to punish California and other Democratic states that refuse the administration’s demands for voter data.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin threatened local election officials with fines and prison if they don’t turn over voter rolls to federal officials seeking to root out purported illegal voting by non-citizens.
“Try us,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote on X in response to Mullin’s threats. He added that “California has free, fair, and secure elections” and that the state “will fight for them.”
The administration’s threats — made less than four months before the November midterm elections — are a continuation of an aggressive Trump-led campaign to use the federal government to attempt to overhaul the nation’s voting systems and sow public mistrust in elections.
The administration has tried for months to compel Democrat-led states into handing over sensitive voter data to the federal government, but the efforts have run into resistance in courts, in part out of concern for privacy laws. The courts have also reaffirmed in many cases that the Constitution gives states — not the federal government — primary authority over elections.
On Friday, Mullin said his agency has found “as many as” 190,832 possible non-citizens registered to vote in California, along with more in three other Democratic-led states. He said Homeland Security arrived at those numbers by checking the four states’ public voter records.
He vowed to withhold federal election security grants from states until they agree to the administration’s demands, including having their voter registration lists “scrubbed” and their election security systems updated.
“If these states want a grant and they want to be reimbursed to run federal elections, they are going to have to implement security measures,” Mullin said at a news conference. “We need to make sure that individuals who are legally able to vote are voting.”
Newsom said the state had “no idea” where that claim came from. The administration has not made its methodology public, and the system Mullin’s department has used to check for non-citizens in the past has inaccurately flagged some citizens as non-citizens. Past election reviews have found non-citizen voting is rare.
“There is plenty of reason to be suspicious of the claims from the administration,” said Brendan Fisher, director of strategic investigations at the Campaign Legal Center, “and every reason for voters to have confidence in our elections.”
Mullin’s remarks came the day after Trump delivered a prime-time address about vulnerabilities in the election system, claims that largely were not backed up by the evidence he provided. The White House released a trove of declassified documents that fell short of showing that any American election had been affected by fraud or foreign interference.
The White House dug in on the strategy Friday morning, deploying agency heads to continue amplifying the idea of election vulnerabilities, even after fact-checks showed most of his claims were exaggerated and had been previously known, investigated or debunked.
“SAVE OUR ELECTIONS,” the White House said on X.
Trump also used his address to pressure Congress to pass legislation that would tighten voting restrictions and could make it harder for millions to register to vote and cast ballots. While hardline Republicans applauded him, others in the party have rebuffed his request.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Friday that he did not understand why Trump is focusing on a past election when Republicans should focus on what is ahead.
“I think historically the midterms for the party in power are really tough,” Cornyn said. “So, yeah, I am concerned about it. We ought to be talking about things looking forward that our constituents are most concerned about.”
Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the nation’s electoral systems are safe, and while he thinks election officials need to be “vigilant,” he said he is more concerned about economic issues ahead of the midterms..
Discussing the legislation ahead of the speech Thursday, Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said it would be “impossible” to carry out changes to the nation’s voting laws in time for the midterms.
“The only thing that will occur is an undermining of the integrity of our elections right now,” Tillis said on the Senate floor.
David Becker, the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, called Mullin’s threats “laughable.”
“There is no significant pool of federal grant money appropriated, so this threat has no teeth for any state. None of them are expecting any significant federal funds for elections,” Becker said.
Mullin told reporters Friday the federal government plans to use public records requests to try to obtain the voter roll information in order to investigate whether non-citizens have voted. Any member of the public can make a public records request; the move signals that the government has few remaining avenues to force the state to turn over voter data.
But Mullin appeared to acknowledge the limitations, saying: “I obviously can’t force the states.” He later threatened to levy fines, penalties or criminal charges against elections officials in states that don’t comply with the government’s demand.
If their behavior wasn’t criminal, Mullin said he would make sure state and county officials — who do not work for the federal government — would “never work for the federal government again.”
More than a dozen courts have ruled against the Justice Department’s highly unusual demand for state voter rolls. The federal government is not entitled to the data under federal law, Becker said.
He said previous government investigations into non-citizen voting have found that most people flagged against DHS’ database were either citizens or non-citizens who had never registered themselves to vote.
The Trump administration has used a database from an immigration verification system to flag possible non-citizen voters, but election officials have found that method misidentified some voters. Even with citizens mistakenly included in the count, the number of possible ineligible voters was extremely low — in Texas, 0.0001% of voters.
Data indicate that voting by non-citizens is rare. A study of the 2016 election by the Brennan Center for Justice found that officials referred about 30 cases of suspected non-citizen voting for investigation or prosecution. A 2024 review by the American Immigration Council of the right-wing Heritage Foundation‘s database turned up 68 cases of noncitizen voting since the 1980s.
While Trump’s speech prompted warnings from his critics that he could be laying the groundwork to take further steps to interfere with or tighten restrictions on elections, experts said he was running out of moves.
Becker predicted that Trump would not actually attempt to cancel elections or send officers to the polls and that courts would block the president if he declared a national emergency to exert control over elections.
“But I think there are people in the administration, including the president himself, who would like us all to think this is possible,” he said.
Fisher said Trump may be trying to lay the groundwork to dispute the midterm results if he doesn’t like the outcome, but said his powers to do so are limited.
“There’s safeguards and laws in place to protect the freedom to vote,” Fisher said, “and voters should tune out the noise and continue to participate in our democracy.”
