From ABC7 New York · · 2m
Whistleblower: DHS agents told to lie for voter rolls
Two senators say a DHS insider described agents ordered to misrepresent themselves and manufacture voter fraud evidence weeks before the midterms.
In brief
Two senators say a DHS insider described agents ordered to misrepresent themselves and manufacture voter fraud evidence weeks before the midterms. The claim is not that DHS looked at voter data, it is that agents were told to break state law to get it and to build fraud cases that did not exist. Originally reported by…
A whistleblower goes public
Sen. Chuck Schumer and Sen. Alex Padilla said Monday that a DHS insider warned the department told hundreds of agents to get into state voter rolls, even if they had to misrepresent themselves.
Agents pulled off national security
Schumer said the agents were taken off national security work and sent looking for fraud that has already been investigated and disproved many times over.
“The goal: to try and prove Trump's sad, tired, and long-debunked election conspiracy theories.”
The Unlawful Voter Initiative
Schumer named the alleged program and said agents were commanded to violate state laws to reach private voter information and to fabricate law enforcement records.
“hunting for, or worse, manufacturing evidence of voter fraud claims”
A letter to the secretary
The two senators laid out the whistleblower's claims in a letter sent Sunday to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin, demanding an explanation and an immediate stop to the effort.
DHS says it was public data
The department told ABC News it pulled publicly available voter roll data and cross referenced it against known aliens in its systems, calling that a simple election security step.
“It's not rocket science; it's an easy step to secure our elections”
Why go around the states
Homeland Security Investigations has been ramping up fraud hunting nationwide with help from USCIS. Padilla said the federal route exists because states like California refused to hand over records.
Promised they won't be liable
Officers who questioned whether the initiative was legal were reportedly told to proceed anyway, with assurances they would not be held personally liable.
“If this effort is truly legal, then why does DHS leadership have to promise its officers that they're not going to be held liable?”
The worry about November
Padilla called the initiative a pretext for building a case against the coming results. Schumer said voters should not fear their own government over how they registered.
“manufactured evidence to intimidate voters, to disenfranchise eligible Americans, and even undermine or challenge this November's election results”
The bottom line
The claim is not that DHS looked at voter data, it is that agents were told to break state law to get it and to build fraud cases that did not exist.
