The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and eight other groups sued the Trump administration on 18 September to keep Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) away from polling places1. They filed in federal court in Washington. The coalition includes Mi Familia en Acción, the National Urban League and the SEIU, AFT and UFCW unions. The complaint cites sections 592 and 593 of Title 18 of the US Code, which bar armed federal officers and troops at elections, and the Voting Rights Act's intimidation provisions. Denver and immigrant-rights groups had filed the first such suit the week before.
The same day NPR published a 2025 internal email from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), released through the Democratic National Committee's freedom-of-information lawsuit2. It attached a 78-page list of counties and states offering non-English election materials alongside a Justice Department checklist for prosecuting voter-related crimes. DHS's own court filing calls the email "a subordinate sharing initial thoughts and opinions with leadership", and nothing in it refers to enforcement at those places.
DHS told NPR that ICE "is not planning operations targeting polling locations", but that "intelligence-driven targeted enforcement" could still lead to arrests if "an active public safety threat endangered a polling location". That qualification leaves room for arrests at a polling place, and the suit asks a judge to close it. A University of California San Diego poll released the same week found about 40% of voters expect ICE agents at their own polling place. That expectation ran at roughly a third or more among Democrats, Republicans and independents alike.
DHS lost a separate election-related appeal earlier this month, when the D.C. Circuit refused to revive its modified SAVE citizenship database.
