Nana Wu
In a dimly lit, windowless room deep within the Justice Department’s Washington D.C. headquarters in mid-December 2020, a critical meeting convened. Federal officials tasked with safeguarding American elections from fraud were summoned by Attorney General William Barr. The nation was gripped by Donald Trump’s increasingly fervent claims that the presidential election had been stolen. His obsession had fixated on a conspiracy theory alleging that voting machines in Antrim County, Michigan, had manipulated votes from him to Joe Biden. With each passing day, Trump intensified his pressure, seeking to leverage the full force of the federal government to overturn his electoral defeat.
Within the confines of this fortified space, Barr interrogated experts from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), seated alongside top FBI officials. The assembled group of approximately ten individuals faced a pivotal question: could the 2020 presidential vote have been compromised through hacking? ProPublica’s account of this previously undisclosed meeting, drawn from multiple sources present or briefed on the gathering, highlights its significance. At the time, Barr walked a precarious tightrope. He had directed the FBI to investigate allegations of election irregularities while publicly stating that federal authorities had found "no evidence to date" of widespread fraud.
The nonpartisan CISA specialists, supported by their FBI counterparts, presented their findings regarding Antrim County. They explained that a clerk’s error in updating ballot styles on voting machines had caused a software malfunction. This glitch, they clarified, initially transferred votes from Republican to Democratic candidates. The issue was not fraud, but human error, a fact that would soon be publicly corroborated by a hand count of the county’s ballots.
Barr, listening intently, appeared to grasp both the factual truth of the situation and the likely personal cost of delivering it to the President. At the meeting’s conclusion, he turned to his top deputy, making a motion as if tying a bandana, and declared his intention to "kamikaze" into the White House.
The subsequent events are widely known. On December 14, 2020, during a meeting with Trump in the Oval Office, the President launched into a lengthy monologue, presenting the Antrim County situation as "absolute proof" that the election had been rigged. Barr, struggling to interject, eventually presented the findings from CISA. Following this, Barr submitted his resignation letter, which Trump accepted. Barr departed with the belief that he had upheld democratic norms, later writing in his memoir, "I was saddened. If he actually believed this stuff he had become significantly detached from reality."
Barr was not alone. Numerous federal officials, many of them Trump appointees, resisted the President’s demands, which only escalated after Barr’s departure. While the January 6th Capitol riot, fueled by Trump’s supporters, temporarily disrupted the certification of the election results, the institutional safeguards of American democracy, though tested, ultimately held.
However, an in-depth examination by ProPublica reveals a disquieting reality: if faced with similar challenges today, many of the individuals and the robust guardrails that held the line would be absent.
ProPublica’s investigation into the final days of the 2020 election’s challenges uncovered previously undisclosed aspects of a federal effort to safeguard the results, involving at least 75 individuals across multiple agencies. Today, nearly all of these individuals have departed, either through resignation, termination, or reassignment, particularly within the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security. This includes the cybersecurity specialists who debunked the Antrim County allegations.
Crucially, the individuals identified as resisting attempts to overturn the 2020 election have been replaced by approximately two dozen individuals installed by Trump in positions with the potential to influence future elections. Ten of these new appointees actively worked to reverse the 2020 vote, and the remainder are associates of such individuals. In some instances, ProPublica found, officials have been recruited from activist groups central to the election denial movement, a development experts warn signifies a concerning integration of this movement within the federal government.
These new appointments carry significant implications for how Trump may react to upcoming midterms, especially given current polling that suggests Republicans are approaching a potentially significant electoral loss. With the President’s approval ratings nearing historic lows, and public concern mounting over the economy, the administration’s deportation policies, and the war in Iran, Trump has intensified efforts to "nationalize" the 2026 elections. He has asserted that Republicans must "take over" the midterms. Democrats who monitored Trump’s attempts to subvert his 2020 defeat are now questioning his willingness to accept a "blue wave," particularly if it results in the opposition party regaining control of a House of Representatives that impeached him twice.
ProPublica’s investigation further details how the President has mobilized his loyalists to reshape election processes. This includes shedding new light on the FBI raid in Georgia to seize 2020 election materials and the administration’s use of federal resources to investigate non-citizens voting. Ultimately, the reporting indicates a profound and expansive overhaul of the federal government, leading some to fear it is becoming a mechanism to ensure electoral outcomes favorable to Trump.
The ProPublica reporting is based on interviews with approximately 30 current or former executive branch officials with knowledge of the operations of Trump loyalists now in election-related roles. The majority spoke on condition of anonymity, citing concerns about potential retribution, including those with direct knowledge of the December 2020 Barr meeting.
The Trump administration maintains that its actions are intended to enhance the fairness and security of U.S. elections and to prevent ineligible individuals, such as non-citizens, from voting. White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson stated, "Election integrity has always been a top priority for President Trump. The President will do everything in his power to defend the safety and security of American elections and to ensure that only American citizens are voting in them." Spokespeople for the Department of Justice (DOJ) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) emphasized their departments’ focus on ensuring free and fair elections and their collaborative efforts with states to achieve these goals, dismissing contrary contentions as false.
Despite these efforts, some institutional guardrails remain, preventing Trump from fully enacting his election agenda. Judges have blocked key provisions of a March 2025 executive order that sought to increase federal control over voting processes, and some Republican state officials have opposed Justice Department lawsuits demanding access to state voter rolls. In late March, Trump issued another executive order on elections, aiming to exert unprecedented federal control over mail-in voting and voter eligibility, an order currently facing legal challenges from Democrats and voting rights groups. Experts predict that 2026 will represent an unprecedented stress test for the integrity of American elections.
The Dismantling of Election Security Infrastructure
In the tumultuous days following the 2020 election, Attorney General Barr described his efforts to counter Trump’s barrage of false election claims as akin to playing "Whac-A-Mole." The investigators at DHS’s CISA provided critical intelligence that debunked many of these claims, not solely those concerning Antrim County.
CISA, established during Trump’s first term, was designed to counter cyber threats, particularly in the wake of Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. It evolved to offer vital expertise and support to local election officials facing increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks. Post-2020, CISA played a crucial role in dispelling misinformation disseminated by Trump supporters, launching a "Rumor Control" website and issuing a joint statement with election infrastructure stakeholders declaring the election "the most secure in American history." Despite this, Trump swiftly fired Chris Krebs, the appointed head of CISA, who had defended the election’s integrity.
Upon his return to the Oval Office, one of Trump’s initial actions was to dismantle CISA’s election security functions. Beginning in February 2025, DHS leadership placed employees focused on countering disinformation and safeguarding elections on administrative leave. The agency also froze other election security initiatives, including assessments of local election offices for physical and cybersecurity risks and the dissemination of sensitive threat intelligence. Ultimately, all approximately three dozen CISA employees specializing in election security were either terminated or reassigned.
"It took years of dedicated, bipartisan, cross-sector partnership to build the security infrastructure we’ve had, and dismantling CISA leaves a gaping hole," stated Kathy Boockvar, a former Pennsylvania Secretary of State and election security expert. "We are making the job of securing our democracy exponentially harder." A DHS spokesperson countered that these changes were a response to "a ballooning budget concealing a dangerous departure from its statutory mission," accusing CISA of "electioneering instead of defending America’s critical infrastructure." The spokesperson affirmed that CISA’s core mission of protecting critical infrastructure and supporting local partners against cyber threats remains unchanged.
The erosion of election security capabilities extends beyond CISA. The Trump administration has dismantled or diminished other federal initiatives vital to election integrity and combating foreign interference. While many of these actions have been reported individually, their collective impact reveals a significant weakening of national election defenses. The National Security Council’s election security group, responsible for coordinating federal efforts, was dissolved. Subsequently, in August, the Foreign Malign Influence Center, part of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) tasked with countering interference from Russia, China, and Iran, was dismantled. An ODNI spokesperson claimed the center was redundant and its functions were integrated into other areas, enhancing efficiency. However, former national security officials expressed concern that these integrations have led to a significant reduction in operational capacity.
Caitlin Durkovich, who led the NSC’s election security efforts during the Biden administration, stated that under Trump, the federal government has "abandoned" its traditional role in preserving election integrity and security. "Nearly every program and capability to stop bad actors and support election administrators has been dismantled," she warned. "Heading into the midterms, this leaves states and localities exposed, without the intelligence support or federal coordination they need to detect and respond to threats in real time – precisely when the stakes are highest."
The early months of the second Trump administration also saw significant changes within three key federal law enforcement agencies involved in elections. Kash Patel, the new FBI Director, disbanded the public corruption team, which had been instrumental in monitoring potential criminal activity on Election Day. The Foreign Influence Task Force, designed to counter foreign interference in U.S. politics, was also disbanded. An FBI spokesperson affirmed the bureau’s continued commitment to detecting and countering foreign influence.
Furthermore, the Justice Department significantly reduced the role of its Public Integrity Section, historically responsible for ensuring that departmental inquiries remained free from political influence. Senior lawyers within the section had previously cautioned against the FBI investigating Trump-allied fraud claims, fearing it would damage the agency’s reputation and appear partisan. While their advice was overruled by Barr and his deputies at the time, former officials noted this as a rare instance where their guidance was disregarded, making the section a temporary roadblock that no longer exists.
A month after Trump’s return to the Oval Office, the Public Integrity Section’s top staff resigned when agency leadership directed them to drop corruption charges against then-New York City Mayor Eric Adams. More resignations and transfers followed. The 36-person section was reduced to just two individuals. The administration no longer mandates that the section review politically sensitive cases, according to multiple sources.
The Civil Rights Division’s voting section, responsible for enforcing federal voting rights laws, particularly those combating racial discrimination, also underwent significant changes. In December 2020, the assistant attorney general overseeing the Civil Rights Division and other leaders threatened to resign if Trump promoted Jeffrey Clark, who supported efforts to overturn election results, to head the department following Barr’s resignation. This collective threat prevented Clark’s promotion. However, nearly all of the section’s approximately 30 career lawyers have since resigned or been transferred. This exodus accelerated after Harmeet Dhillon, Trump’s assistant attorney general for civil rights, issued a memo shifting the section’s mission from ensuring voting rights to enforcing Trump’s executive order on elections. The administration then appointed conservative lawyers to the section, some of whom had challenged the 2020 vote or worked with individuals who sought to overturn it.
"It’s just a shocking and depressing reversal of the federal government’s role in making real the promise of nondiscrimination in voting and racial equality," stated Anna Baldwin, a former appellate attorney for the Civil Rights Division who now litigates against the Justice Department. The Justice Department did not respond to specific inquiries regarding the dismantling of the Public Integrity Section or the shift in the Civil Rights Division’s mission. In total, ProPublica found that at least 75 career officials who played crucial roles in election-related work at DHS, DOJ, and other departments have either left or been terminated.
Team America and the New Guard
In late summer, after the forced departure of most career specialists, a select group of political appointees began convening at DHS headquarters. This group, reportedly calling itself "Team America," sought to identify federal mechanisms to implement Trump’s March executive order concerning elections, an effort not previously reported. These individuals represent a new leadership paradigm.
Key members included David Harvilicz, a DHS assistant secretary tasked with overseeing election infrastructure security, including voting machines, and three of his senior staff. As previously reported by ProPublica, Harvilicz co-founded an AI company with an architect of Trump’s claims regarding Antrim County. Despite legal setbacks for the executive order, sources indicated minimal discussion or dissent regarding acting on directives from Harvilicz or his deputies. "It was just us saluting to do it," a former federal official remarked.
This core group was part of a broader initiative across DHS, DOJ, and the White House to advance the President’s agenda. Some of Trump’s new appointees are well-known figures. For instance, Kash Patel, according to a former Justice Department official, allegedly pressured military officials to investigate conspiracy theories about voting machines. While Patel did not respond to requests for comment, he claimed in congressional testimony that he did not recall the event. Others, like Harvilicz, are less public but wield considerable influence. These new appointees are tasked with executing Trump’s executive orders and are unlikely to challenge his unsubstantiated claims of widespread election fraud.
Members of Team America have themselves amplified or propagated such narratives. Heather Honey, serving under Harvilicz in a newly created election-focused role, falsely claimed that Pennsylvania had more ballots cast than registered voters in the 2020 presidential election. Trump cited this claim, which has been traced back to her, in his exhortations for his supporters to march on the Capitol on January 6, 2021. At least 11 administration appointees, including Honey, have ties to the Election Integrity Network, a conservative grassroots organization advocating for significant changes in American elections, led by Cleta Mitchell, an attorney who actively attempted to help Trump overturn the 2020 election results. Gineen Bresso, holding a senior position in the White House counsel’s office, coordinated with the network’s leadership in 2024 as the Republican National Committee’s election integrity chair. Since joining the government, Honey has maintained close connections with Mitchell’s organization, and she, along with at least two other federal officials, have provided private briefings to its members.
Experts suggest that these former activists, instrumental in fostering a movement centered on the belief that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump, are now working to prevent a similar outcome. "The election denial movement is now interwoven within the federal government, and they are working together toward a shared goal of reshaping elections" in ways that undermine voting rights, stated Brendan Fischer, director at the Campaign Legal Center. "It’s not just last-minute slapdash attempts to overturn the results, but more systematic efforts to influence how elections are run months ahead of time."
In response to inquiries from ProPublica, a DHS spokesperson disputed that the department’s powers were being used to benefit Trump, asserting that its employees are "focused on keeping our elections safe, secure, and free" and are working to "implement the President’s policies." Regarding ties to the election denial movement, the spokesperson stated, "To meet the diverse and evolving challenges the Department faces, we hire experts with diverse backgrounds who go through a rigorous vetting process." Mitchell did not respond to detailed questions. The White House, in response to inquiries about Bresso’s connection to Mitchell’s network, reiterated its commitment to election security.
Throughout the fall and winter, as the Justice Department sought confidential voter roll information from states, Team America focused on resolving technical challenges hindering the use of digital tools to identify non-citizens registered to vote. Honey and others worked on integrating data from various agencies and crafting data-sharing agreements. When faced with obstacles, they reportedly approached the White House or senior DHS leaders for assistance. Initially, the plan involved processing voter information obtained by the DOJ through DHS’s Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) system. More recently, Team America has reportedly been working to leverage a more powerful tool from Homeland Security Investigations to enhance its ability to identify noncitizen voters and pursue criminal charges.
While DHS reported that SAVE identified over 21,000 potential noncitizens on voter rolls in the past year, detailed checks by officials have revealed significant inaccuracies, as previously reported by ProPublica. Most states have identified only a few to a few hundred potential noncitizens as registered voters, with a much smaller number having actually voted. The DHS spokesperson maintained that SAVE is "secure and reliable." As the election approaches, current and former officials and election security experts express concern that Harvilicz and Honey, who have promoted debunked conspiracy theories about elections, are in positions to control the narrative surrounding the vote’s integrity.
"It’s hard to debunk false claims coming with the seal of the federal government," observed Derek Tisler, counsel and manager at the Brennan Center for Justice’s elections and government program. "I certainly worry what damage that could do to voters’ confidence."
Red Flags in the Investigation
Perhaps the most stark illustration of the breakdown in safeguards that thwarted Trump’s most extreme impulses in 2020 is his creation of a special White House post last fall to reinvestigate his loss to Biden. In December 2020, shortly after Barr rejected Trump’s claims about Antrim County, lawyers in the White House counsel’s office helped prevent the President from heeding activists’ calls for martial law to seize voting machines – a chaotic meeting that has been described as the "craziest meeting of the first Trump administration."
However, the lawyer Trump hired in 2025 as his director of election security and integrity, Kurt Olsen, had actively worked to overturn Trump’s 2020 loss in court and was subsequently sanctioned by judges for making baseless allegations regarding Arizona elections. Olsen’s work in the second Trump administration has blurred the lines between the White House and DOJ officials, a firewall established after Watergate to prevent law enforcement decisions from being influenced by political pressure, according to Gary Restaino, a former U.S. Attorney in Arizona. "This is not a constitutional or even a statutory requirement," Restaino stated, "but it’s a democracy requirement to make sure that citizens throughout America understand that decisions about life and liberty are being made in an objective and consistent manner."
In a series of previously unreported events around the end of 2025, Olsen traveled to Georgia to meet with Paul Brown, the head of the FBI’s Atlanta field office. Olsen sought the FBI’s seizure of 2020 ballots from Fulton County, presenting a report he claimed would justify such an extraordinary action. Brown and his team emphasized that any investigation would be independent and fair. Upon reviewing the report, Brown’s team found that Georgia’s election board had already investigated and dismissed many of the allegations, concluding that others stemmed from human error, not criminal wrongdoing. The report had been compiled by a longtime ally of Olsen and a participant in the Election Integrity Network with a history of discredited claims. Based on their independent investigation, Brown’s team submitted an affidavit to their superiors at DOJ that did not establish sufficient grounds to proceed with Olsen’s request.
Shortly thereafter, Brown was reportedly given a choice: retire or accept a reassignment. An FBI spokesperson stated that Brown "elected to retire" and that the bureau’s "work in the election security space is entirely consistent with the law." Olsen did not respond to requests for comment. Brown’s departure after refusing to carry out the seizure of 2020 election materials has been reported, but Olsen’s involvement and the specifics of their interactions leading to Brown’s retirement have not been previously disclosed. With Brown’s exit, the case proceeded under his successor.
Trump administration officials also took steps to control the investigation. Then-Attorney General Pam Bondi appointed Thomas Albus, whom Trump had appointed U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, to prosecute the case, despite it falling outside his usual jurisdiction. Albus had been meeting with Olsen since around the time the White House lawyer was hired. In late January, the FBI executed an unprecedented raid in Fulton County. The agency’s affidavit, compiled by Albus and Brown’s replacement, cited a version of Olsen’s report to Brown as justification for the seizure. ProPublica was part of a news coalition that sued to unseal the affidavit. An FBI spokesperson stated that agents "followed all procedure to ensure everything was in proper order, and FBI evidence team had the necessary court-authorized search warrant before they arrived on site."
Ryan Crosswell, who served in the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section for five years handling numerous election cases, described Brown’s replacement and Albus’s involvement as a "red flag" due to the unusual circumstances of their appointments. "They’re just moving through people until they find someone who’s willing to do exactly what they want," Crosswell stated. The Justice Department did not comment on Crosswell’s assertion.
The extraordinary raid was also facilitated by the dismantling of the DOJ’s Public Integrity Section. Multiple former lawyers from the section indicated they would likely have blocked the Fulton County investigation due to a lack of strong evidence, its clear political bias, and its violation of department directives against actions taken "for the purpose of giving an advantage or disadvantage to any candidate or political party." Crosswell remarked, "Based on everything we know, if PIN was still there, we’d say no." John Keller, former principal deputy chief and acting chief of the Public Integrity Section, expressed concern that allegations of irregularities in upcoming elections will be handled on a partisan basis. "Without that review and without apolitical, objective, honest brokers involved in the process, there is a much greater risk for intentional manipulation or inadvertent interference," Keller stated.
"Dismantling the Brain"
The week the FBI seized Fulton County’s ballots, approximately half of the nation’s secretaries of state converged in Washington D.C. for their winter conference. They had urgent questions regarding election security for Bondi, then-DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, and other prominent figures who had promised to attend. However, none of the headline speakers appeared, leaving attendees facing an empty podium until the session was abruptly canceled. This breakdown epitomized the widening chasm between state officials and the federal government agencies that had, until recently, collaborated to secure American elections.
Shenna Bellows, Maine’s Democratic Secretary of State, described the trust between the Trump administration and states as "absolutely demolished." This erosion of trust stems from the significant number of election deniers assuming top roles within federal agencies. Honey, for instance, sometimes represents DHS on cross-departmental calls with state election chiefs, a disconcerting reality for those who spent years countering the false claims she previously espoused. During a February call, state officials expressed confusion regarding CISA’s continued assessment of their election systems for physical and cyber vulnerabilities. Honey indicated it would proceed, but Bellows stated she had been informed otherwise. Two DHS officials told ProPublica that remaining CISA staff avoid election work, fearing job loss if they engage with state and local officials. "In CISA, elections are a toxic poison," one official said. A DHS spokesperson countered that state and federal officials continue to work together "every single day" to protect elections and that "The claim that DHS has a broken partnership with states and made our elections less secure is simply false."
The reduction in career election specialists and their departments has eliminated crucial information channels that tracked threats during voting, including Election Day command posts operated by the Justice Department and FBI. Another information channel, previously funded by DHS, will continue to operate but will be accessible only to state and local election offices, not the federal government. Jessica Cadigan, a former FBI intelligence analyst who investigated Election Day threats, highlighted the critical role of the FBI headquarters’ command post in her cases. "That is dismantling the brain, if you will," she stated. "They are the ones that piece the whole thing together." An FBI spokesperson affirmed that the agency retains capabilities to monitor situations on the ground through designated election crimes coordinator experts in all its field offices.
Jena Griswold, Colorado’s Democratic Secretary of State, now views the federal government as adversarial to elections and election administration, rather than a partner. Colorado is among the approximately 30 states sued by the Justice Department for confidential voter roll information. While at least four courts have dismissed these cases, the Justice Department has appealed most decisions. Griswold informed ProPublica that she has increased her legal staff to counter future actions from the Trump administration. "Donald Trump," she concluded, "has made American elections less safe."
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