11NOV

Watchdog sues DHS over Mullin's 250,000

2 min read

18:10UTC

American Oversight sued DHS on 30 September for the records behind Secretary Markwayne Mullin's claim of 250,000 non-citizens on voter rolls, a day after CREW filed a similar suit.

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Key takeaway

Two watchdogs are suing DHS for the evidence behind its claim of 250,000 non-citizen registrants.

American Oversight, a watchdog group, sued the Homeland Security department (DHS) in federal court in Washington on 30 September under the Freedom of Information Act⁠¹. It wants the records behind Secretary Markwayne Mullin's 17 July claim that DHS had found 250,000 non-citizens on voter rolls, 190,832 of them in California. American Oversight says it filed two requests on 21 August and that DHS acknowledged them on 31 August.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), another watchdog group, filed a similar suit a day earlier against DHS and US Citizenship and Immigration Services, the immigration agency inside the department, with a motion for a preliminary injunction⁠². American Oversight says Mullin's figure rested on "an analysis of commercial databases" without driver licence or Social Security numbers.

Both suits seek the evidence for DHS's own count in the week the Supreme Court revived the department's bulk citizenship checks for election officials. They follow the Democratic National Committee's own freedom-of-information suit against DHS, which produced a 2025 internal email that NPR published in September.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

On 17 July Markwayne Mullin, the Secretary of Homeland Security, said his department had found 250,000 non-citizens registered to vote. Most were in California, with smaller numbers in New Jersey, Nevada and Pennsylvania. Only US citizens may vote in federal elections. A claim that large would matter, so two watchdog groups asked to see the evidence under the Freedom of Information Act, which lets the public request government records. The department has not handed anything over, so both groups have now gone to court. A judge can order the department to release the records by a set date.

Deep Analysis

Root Causes

Non-citizen voting claims resist testing because no single US database holds every citizen. The federal government has never kept a national citizenship register, so any count relies on matching voter lists against partial records.

The Freedom of Information Act is the main tool outsiders have to see the method. American Oversight filed its requests on 21 August; DHS acknowledged them on 31 August and, it says, has produced nothing. A suit lets a judge set a deadline the agency does not set itself.

What could happen next?

Consequence
CREW's preliminary-injunction motion could force a court-set release timetable for the records before 3 November.
Meaning
The only state check reported so far, in Nevada, found no non-citizens on DHS's confirmed list, according to American Oversight and Democracy Docket.

Source Landscape

This story draws on neutral-leaning sources

Primary parallel: In 2017 Maine's Secretary of State, Matthew Dunlap, sued the presidential election integrity commission he sat on for its working papers. Dunlap said the documents released in August 2018 contained no evidence for the claims of mass illegal voting that had prompted the commission.

Counter-parallel: In 2012 Florida drew up a list of about 180,000 suspected non-citizen voters from driver licence data. It shrank to about 2,600 names after checks, and fewer than 100 were removed, though a small number of genuine non-citizen registrations did exist.

Consensus view: American Oversight says the 250,000 figure came from 'an analysis of commercial databases' without driver licence or Social Security numbers. Matching on names and birth dates alone produces false matches, which is why both suits ask for the method as well as the totals.

Counter-view: the Supreme Court's 25 September per curiam said blocking DHS's expanded SAVE 'inhibits the Federal Government's efforts to assist state and local agencies' in running the midterms. On that view, the department's data work has a lawful purpose whatever the 17 July number shows. The suits test the claim, not the department's wider powers.

Key tension: Whether DHS's 'confirmed' lists hold up when states check them. American Oversight and Democracy Docket relay that Nevada found every name DHS sent it to be a citizen; if that holds, the gap between 15,903 claimed and none confirmed is the story.

First Reported In

Update #19 · Bulk voter citizenship checks are back

American Oversight· 1 Oct 2026

Read original →

Causes and effects

This Event

Watchdog sues DHS over Mullin's 250,000

Two suits now seek the evidence behind DHS's own headline count of non-citizen registrants in the week the department regained bulk citizenship checks.

Led to

North Carolina's SAVE check flags 1,392

North Carolina's count of 1,392 sits far below DHS's national claim of 250,000.

Occurred 13 Oct 2026

Read story →

Different Perspectives

University of Florida Election Lab

The lab, run by Michael McDonald, estimates about 124.3 million ballots, a raw midterm record, and turnout of about 49.4% of eligible voters, second to 2018's 50.05%. The raw record reflects population growth more than a record rate, so the late count is working through a near-2018 electorate.

Thune's critics on the right, including Senator Ron Johnson

Ron Johnson backed the failed 31-15 motion to delay Thune's re-election, after activists such as Mike Cernovich blamed the leader for the defeat. Their complaint is that Republicans could have passed the SAVE Act; in January it meets a Democratic Senate instead.

Senator John Thune

Thune was re-elected Senate Republican leader by acclamation on 10 November after a motion to delay failed 31-15. He kept the filibuster that stopped the SAVE Act, the choice his critics on the right blame for the defeat.

House Republicans under Jim Jordan

House Republicans elected Jordan minority leader by 106 votes to 73 over Steve Scalise on 10 November, after Speaker Mike Johnson declined to run. They replaced the leadership that lost the majority, while Senate Republicans kept theirs.

Donald Trump

Trump asked on Truth Social on 9 November whether anybody believed the election "was honest" and blamed the machines, having told The New York Times on polling night he would accept the results. No Republican campaign had sued over a 2026 result by 10 November, so the claim has no case behind it.

Judge David O. Carter

Carter closed the Justice Department's suit over about 20,000 California mail ballots on 10 November after the department withdrew it, writing that the suit "attempted to disrupt an ongoing election". The closure leaves the department with no court order touching a 2026 California ballot.

Written with AI from Lowdown's published reporting. Not individually reviewed by an editor. Editorial standards.