On September 1, Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said ICE agents could enter polling places this November to serve warrants or respond to “specific threats.” Nine days later, LULAC, Common Cause, UnidosUS, and the City and County of Denver sued him.
The lawsuit asks court to confirm what the law has always said: no one will have to walk past an armed federal agent to cast their ballot. I’ll explain the law briefly, but the more interesting part of this story is what it says about how people are standing up for each other—over and over again—in the face of authoritarianism.
Federal Law Has Banned Armed Agents From Polling Places Since 1865
Federal law has barred armed federal agents from polling places since 1865 when Congress wrote a law saying no president could put soldiers between voters and the ballot box. In every election since, the number of armed federal agents legally allowed at your polling place has been zero.
The Trump administration knows this. That’s why each “assurance” it offers comes with an exception: ICE won’t be at the polls, except for a warrant, or a threat, or an arrest that just happens to occur there. So, with early voting set to begin this month, the plaintiffs asked a federal judge to say plainly, in advance of the election, what the law already says: no armed federal forces at polling places, drop boxes, or counting rooms.
Minneapolis Already Proved That Standing Together Works
This lawsuit is another example of how people are running their own playbook against authoritarianism. Last December, the administration sent thousands of ICE and Border Patrol agents into the Twin Cities, the largest immigration operation ever in a single American city. Federal agents murdered two people in Minneapolis alone.
Minneapolis refused to be scared. Clergy knelt on the airport pavement and were arrested singing hymns. Unions, congregations, immigrant defense networks, and block-by-block mutual aid groups fed joined in coordinated response. On January 23, 50,000 people marched through downtown in twenty degrees below zero, and hundreds of businesses closed in solidarity. By mid-February the surge was over and the agents were gone. Scot Nakagawa summarizes these tactics in his post, the Minneapolis Model, which is worth checking out.
Authoritarian power depends on people feeling alone and outmatched. Minneapolis answered that by showing up together, in the cold, in numbers Trump couldn’t ignore. Now that same playbook is activating to prevent the federal threat from moving from neighborhoods to polling places. Filing a lawsuit is a quieter tactic, but it’s the same strategy: people refusing to accept that masked, armed federal agents get to disrupt our communities and our democracy.
Common Cause president Virginia Kase Solomón put it this way: “Putting armed officers in polling places is a tactic used by dictators, but we won’t be scared out of exercising our rights.”
Civil Rights Groups, City Halls, Clerks, and Courts Are All Pushing Back
Look at who signed this complaint. The oldest Latino civil rights organization in the country. The largest Hispanic advocacy organization. A voting rights group with members in every state. And a city government, whose mayor promised to “fight tooth and nail” and whose clerk, the person who actually runs Denver’s elections, said the city will protect them “with cast-iron certainty.”
And there are so many more examples from the last 18 months: States passed their own laws to keep federal forces from the polls. Election officials refused to hand over private voter data. Courts blocked Trump’s mail voting order and stopped the SAVE database purge. The Ohio Organizing Collaborative threw a block party the very week after the FBI raided its offices. Faith leaders, unions, neighbors, clerks, judges, and now the plaintiffs in this case.
Authoritarianism survives by picking off one pillar of society at a time. We win by uniting all those pillars in a common opposition.
This Doesn’t Change Anything About Your Plan to Vote
North Carolina and other states have already started mailing ballots, and some states start early voting in just a few days. You have more ways to vote than ever, and nothing about Trump’s efforts should change your plan. Vote early if you can, and remember that your county clerk runs your election, not the federal government.
If you want to do more than vote, get active:
Nonpartisan groups are holding Hands Off Our Vote trainings across the country.
There are state-specific election protection trainings you to join.
Check out two incredible efforts: It’s Ours and We Are America, and We Vote. Both of these campaigns exist to help make this election feel like what it is: millions of us, together with our communities, choosing our own future.
Joy is a strategy. Defiance is a strategy. Minneapolis proved it in the snow, the groups in this lawsuit are proving it in court, and we’ll all prove it at the polls.
Here’s to a just and joyful future.