ICE reviewed tens of millions of voter records looking for noncitizen voters, records show

Key Points:

• The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) conducted a large-scale election-fraud operation under the Trump administration, analyzing over 99 million records from Justice Department data and independent sources to identify noncitizens suspected of illegal voter registration or voting.
• Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) led a phased national initiative involving voter-roll acquisition, data analysis, and field investigations, targeting multiple states including New Jersey, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, and Ohio, and scrutinizing dozens of nonprofit voter-registration organizations.
• The operation utilized data tools from Palantir, specifically the ELITE system, to process voter rolls and identify foreign nationals potentially subject to removal, while also considering deploying undercover agents to investigate organizations suspected of facilitating illegal voter registration by noncitizens.
• Despite extensive investigations, many nonprofit groups reviewed showed no evidence of wrongdoing, though some organizations, such as the Ohio Organizing Collaborative, were subject to federal scrutiny and raids; HSI also monitored primary elections for vulnerabilities impacting election integrity.
• Internal guidance allowed DHS and ICE to pursue immigration consequences against noncitizens suspected of illegal voting even without criminal prosecution or proof of intent, resulting in hundreds of voter-fraud cases opened and administrative arrests, though many cases were not referred for prosecution.