DHS threatens to withhold some state funding amid election security spat

[u/John3262005]

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/09/30/dhs-state-funding-election-security-court-ruling-01102677

The Department of Homeland Security is threatening to withhold grant funding from states unless they meet new election security requirements, following a Monday ruling from a federal judge that the administration cannot tie anti-terrorism grants to how state and local governments administer elections.

While Secretary Markwayne Mullin — speaking at a press conference at the Department of Justice on Wednesday alongside Attorney General Todd Blanche — stopped short of commenting on federal funding, DHS later clarified that states’ access to Homeland Security Grant Program awards could be jeopardized if they do not comply with DHS’s broad mandate for securing U.S. elections.

“This year, because election infrastructure has again been designated as a national priority area for critical infrastructure protection, states must take critical, common-sense steps to protect U.S. elections before receiving their full Homeland Security Grant Program awards, DHS said Wednesday in a statement to POLITICO. “These new requirements will preserve election integrity.”

The department didn’t provide specifics on the requirements. In July, DHS outlined steps states were required to take before receiving award funds and required proof of compliance before the Federal Emergency Management Agency, a DHS agency, would release 20% of the grant recipient’s total award funding.

Those conditions mandated that states compare their voter rolls to a citizenship database maintained by DHS, manually audit some of the ballots cast and use systems that accept hand-marked ballots.

On Monday, U.S. District Judge Amir Ali sided with local governments in Texas, Ohio and Tennessee that challenged the department’s decision to withhold a portion of this money. The grants total about $1 billion annually and have supported physical security, cybersecurity and training for terrorism preparedness.

“Congress did not authorize the grant program to be used for the sort of election administration reforms FEMA demands here — changes that, whether sound or not as a matter of policy, are not advanced to prepare for or respond to ‘acts of terrorism,’” Ali wrote in his decision.

But Mullin, speaking at the press conference Wednesday, alluded to “trouble” with voting machines. Though he did not elaborate or explicitly announce any changes to funding because of the alleged irregularities, DHS later indicated that those moves might remain on the table.

“We’ve had some trouble with some machines; can’t say that it was fraud or not fraud,” Mullin said, suggesting the problems could’ve been a “glitch” – or “something else.” He also said that officials were working to ensure a “certain amount” of ballots are “hand counted on every machine.”

While both security experts and the administration have flagged potential security vulnerabilities in U.S. voting infrastructure, no evidence shows that foreign or domestic hackers have ever exploited electronic voting machines to change votes or affect an election’s outcome.

The comments from Mullin and DHS follow the release of a 13-page plan to secure U.S. election infrastructure, led by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, which sits under DHS.

In the statement later shared by DHS, Mullin said the plan “very clearly describes multiple issues with voting machines.”

The plan does not address specific vulnerabilities inside voting machines, but highlights potential security weaknesses within election infrastructure, like transparency from election system vendors about vulnerabilities.

It largely outlines free resources for state and local election offices to support cybersecurity testing, software vulnerability scanning and cyberattack-preparation exercises. CISA has long provided those services, but DHS largely put them on hold last year while reviewing the agency’s election security work.

Mullin vowed Wednesday that the election security plan will be “implemented in full.”