U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin stated Tuesday that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers could be present at polling sites nationwide under specific circumstances involving targeted threats or active arrest warrants.
Speaking to reporters, Mullin said ICE personnel will not conduct general patrols at election venues.
“ICE isn’t there to patrol the polling places. We’re there to enforce specific threats,” Mullin said. “The only reason why we would be at polling places is if there is a threat to that polling place or we’re serving a warrant on someone that we have been actively tracking down. ICE’s job is immigration and customs enforcement. That’s their job; if we’re serving a warrant, we will be where we need to be.”
In a statement, the Department of Homeland Security said it does not plan operations targeting polling locations.
DHS noted that ICE conducts “intelligence-driven targeted enforcement” and that individuals posing active public safety threats at polling sites could be arrested through such actions. Under existing federal statutes, armed agents and military personnel are prohibited from being stationed at locations where elections are conducted.
Democratic lawmakers and voting rights organizations have raised concerns about the visibility of federal law enforcement near voting sites ahead of the upcoming elections, arguing that it could discourage voter turnout.
The White House has downplayed plans for broad deployments.
Mullin’s statements follow remarks made in July regarding federal election directives.
“We will scrub all election records, looking for illegal aliens and those who are ineligible to vote, including those that somehow voted, yet were deceased,” Mullin said at the time, stating that state grant funding would be tied to compliance with election security standards.
Regarding non-citizen voter registration claims, DHS identified potential non-citizen registrations in Nevada and later confirmed 185 non-citizens out of an initial estimate of up to 16,000.
In a separate development, Gen. Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, addressed military involvement in a response letter to Sen. Elissa Slotkin.
Caine confirmed that “the joint force has no plans to send federal military personnel or federalized members of the National Guard to polling places during the 2026 elections,” and affirmed that no plans exist to use military personnel to seize ballots, voting machines, or election materials.
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