Sen. John Fetterman joined dozens of Democrats accusing DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin of intentionally undermining 2026 election trust, a charge the department flatly rejected.

In a late September letter, Pennsylvania’s senior senator and more than 30 Democratic colleagues warned Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin to stop what they called an illegal push to federalize the midterms. The Center Square reported that DHS and FEMA answered on Monday and defended the work as basic election security.

The fight is not abstract. Democrats are targeting efforts to keep noncitizens off the rolls, condition homeland-security grants on election safeguards, and investigate unlawful voting. DHS says only Americans should elect American leaders.

Democratic senators demand Mullin halt election security work

The joint letter opens with a direct warning. Senators told Mullin his department is undermining the constitutional role of Congress and the states in running elections and defying federal courts.

They did not soften the charge.

"Your actions as Secretary are intentionally undermining Americans’ trust in the 2026 midterm elections and appear to purposefully disenfranchise eligible voters,"

the letter states. It adds that the combined steps “amount to an illegal attempt to federalize the administration of the upcoming midterm elections.”

Senators accuse Mullin of promoting the president’s election claims, pressuring states into what they call illegal activity, and threatening grant cuts or criminal probes for states that refuse administration demands for voter data. They also criticize the failure to publicly promise that ICE and Customs and Border Protection personnel will stay away from polling places.

The letter cites a Homeland Security Investigations deployment to nine states, including Pennsylvania, for a “coordinated criminal voter fraud surge initiative.” Democrats say that move lacks “verifiable evidence of widespread noncitizen voter fraud.”

Fetterman’s office framed his participation as consistent with prior 2026 letters on election security, including vote-by-mail. His office has been courting conservative campaign cash even as he lines up with party colleagues on this fight.

SAVE checks, voter rolls, and a 250,000 claim

Much of the dispute tracks back to a Trump executive order directing DHS to compare state voter registration lists with federal immigration databases, followed by an overhaul of the SAVE program, the federal system used to verify immigration and citizenship status for benefits and related checks.

Senators note the Supreme Court has allowed SAVE’s use “for now.” They still remind Mullin that the National Voter Registration Act bars systematic removal of ineligible voters within 90 days of Election Day.

They say states did not agree to hand over sensitive voter-roll data and that judges dismissed Justice Department efforts to obtain it. In July, Mullin claimed about 250,000 noncitizens were registered to vote in four states, including Pennsylvania. Senators answer that election experts challenge those figures and that Nevada officials found initial numbers inflated. They also cite inaccuracies in Social Security Administration citizenship categories and questions about how the voter-roll data was obtained.

Their bottom-line demand is broad: stop the contested activities; turn over the information behind Mullin’s July 17, 2026, letter on noncitizens registered to vote; rescind Information Bulletin Nos. 569 and 569(a); release withheld funds to the states without delay; and explain the “Unlawful Voter Initiative.” A whistleblower has alleged that initiative may have led agents to violate laws and DHS policies.

That posture fits a wider pattern in which Fetterman has turned to Republican allies on some fights while still joining Democratic institutional attacks on Trump administration enforcement.

DHS: ICE is not raiding polling places

DHS rejected the senators’ framing. A department spokesperson told reporters ICE is not planning operations that target polling locations.

"ICE conducts intelligence-driven targeted enforcement, and if an active public safety threat endangered a polling location, they may be arrested as a result of that targeted enforcement action."

The same response stressed a statutory duty to protect election infrastructure so contests are fair, honest, and accurate. DHS and the Justice Department, the spokesperson said, are focused on prosecuting and removing aliens who vote and on stopping the dilution of citizens’ ballots.

"Our message to aliens who vote in American elections is clear: we will find you, arrest you, and you will face the consequences, including criminal charges and deportation,"

DHS stated. The closing line was blunt: “ONLY Americans should elect American leaders.”

That message matches comments Mullin made during his confirmation process. Asked about immigration enforcement near polls, he said he did not understand the concern “because honestly if you’re not a citizen you shouldn’t be voting anyways so technically there shouldn’t be illegals at the polling spot.” He added that officers would be present only for a specific threat, “not for intimidation.”

FEMA ties grant money to election safeguards

FEMA drew a hard line as well. Senators claim DHS interference with FEMA grants risks the agency’s mission, slows awards, and hurts communities. FEMA’s reply treated the letter as expected pushback against ordinary safeguards.

"We fully expected opposition to common-sense measures designed to protect election security and safeguard the integrity of American democracy,"

a FEMA spokesperson said. The agency called election security a form of national security and a top Trump administration priority. Concerns over voting processes, data security, and registration practices, FEMA said, made action necessary. States must take “critical, common-sense steps” to protect U.S. elections before receiving their full Homeland Security Grant Program awards, including under the Urban Area Security Initiative and State Homeland Security Grant Program.

“These new requirements will preserve election integrity,” the spokesperson said.

In other words, Washington is using grant conditions to force basic list maintenance and security steps, and Democratic senators want that leverage removed.

Fetterman once helped Mullin reach DHS

The politics around Fetterman and Mullin are not one-note. National Review reported that Fetterman provided the decisive vote to advance Mullin’s DHS nomination out of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, 8-7, breaking with fellow Democrats who opposed Mullin over fitness, experience, and temperament.

Fetterman said at the time that the country needed a leader at DHS and that his yes vote rested on a “strong committed, constructive working relationship with Senator Mullin for our nation’s security.” He now signs a letter accusing that same secretary of intentionally undermining the midterms.

His office still insists Pennsylvania’s senior senator has been “unequivocally clear that our elections are absolutely secure, fair, and accurate.” At the Texas Tribune Festival he praised red states for the “best examples of vote-by-mail” and said criticism of voting is impossible to take seriously “if the only time you criticize voting is if it means you lost.”

Those lines sit uneasily beside a joint Democratic claim that federal enforcement and data requests are a calculated effort to wreck confidence and risk wrongful disenfranchisement. The midterms, the senators, are already underway.

Campaign coverage has also tracked how Fetterman’s operation taps GOP donor networks while he navigates a restless Democratic base at home.

Shapiro prepares a legal and police response

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro struck a familiar tone at a Philadelphia campaign event with Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. He said he is “always worried about Donald Trump and his enablers trying to undermine people’s right to vote.”

Shapiro noted that 43 Trump administration election-integrity lawsuits were dismissed in 2020 while he served as attorney general. He said Pennsylvania is ready again in court and ready if the administration brings personnel into “certain communities, particularly minority communities,” in ways he argues could intimidate voters or deter turnout.

"I'm not going to get into the specifics, but we have great coordination with our Pennsylvania National Guard, with the Pennsylvania State Police, the local law enforcement, and we will do everything in our power to stop Donald Trump from interfering with this election and ensure that whether you vote by mail or you vote in person, you will have access to the ballot box, and it will be protected."

DHS, for its part, denies any plan to seize federal control of the November midterms and repeats that enforcement is intelligence-driven and aimed at unlawful voters and real threats, not at scaring citizens away from the polls.

Separate reporting in the same period noted Justice Department plans to surge election monitors nationwide, another point of friction as federal and state officials jockey over who guards the process.

Fetterman’s standing inside his party remains a live issue, with figures such as the lawmaker in coverage of a possible 2028 primary challenge watching how he handles these institutional fights.

What the letter leaves unresolved

Senators want the data behind Mullin’s July noncitizen-registration claims, the full basis for the HSI surge, and the legal theory for grant conditions and the Unlawful Voter Initiative. DHS and FEMA answer with a simpler proposition: noncitizen voting is illegal, election infrastructure is critical infrastructure, and grant dollars can require states to lock down rolls and systems before the money moves.

Pennsylvania sits in the middle of the map Democrats drew, one of the nine states named for the HSI deployment and one of the four states in Mullin’s 250,000 figure. That guarantees the argument will stay live through the midterm calendar the senators say has already begun.

Lawful elections require citizenship checks, clean rolls, and real penalties for illegal ballots, not another round of letters treating enforcement itself as the scandal.