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source_url: https://www.courthousenews.com/dhs-bids-to-vacuum-up-voter-registration-history-from-all-50-states/
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WASHINGTON (CN) — The Homeland Security Department is looking to collect a sweeping tranche of American voter registration files in an effort the agency says will inform the “fraud detection” activities of its immigration investigations branch.
The move comes as the administration [continues to sow doubt in the security of the U.S. voting system](https://courthousenews.com/supreme-court-frees-trump-to-enforce-mail-in-voting-changes-ahead-of-midterms/) ahead of November’s midterm elections and after President Donald Trump claimed “irrefutable” evidence of foreign meddling in voter data from more than a dozen states.
The proposed acquisition, made public in government contracting [documents](https://sam.gov/workspace/contract/opp/c120b053872c4a6984773f8a413cacad/view) Tuesday, would be conducted by a third-party company which DHS said should have the capacity to collect publicly available voter information from all 50 states and D.C., as well as U.S. territories, at the agency’s direction.
Information collected by the contractor, DHS said, should include voter registration files and, “when applicable,” public voter history files. The data would be used to support “fraud detection and data segmentation” operations of Homeland Security Investigations, the investigative arm of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Collections would take place annually and DHS said it anticipates beginning with a “limited number of jurisdictions,” though it may add additional states and territories during the contract period. The agency said it is also looking for voter history files on all federal elections: general, primary, runoff and special election.
Contractors should follow “applicable jurisdictional laws and access procedures,” DHS said, and should remain politically neutral in data collection. The agency said it is not looking for party affiliation information from the files collected and the contractor should not conduct “political affiliation-based targeting, prioritization or ranking of jurisdictions or individuals.”
Voter records acquired for DHS should be acquired solely in support of the agency’s “defined fraud detection mission,” the agency wrote.
The government has yet to award a contract for its proposed voter data collection. The document published Tuesday is known as a request for information, or RFI, and serves as an initial step in the contract procurement process. It’s unclear how much money DHS plans to spend on the effort.
A spokesperson for the Homeland Security Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
But the agency’s stated effort to expand “fraud detection” capabilities comes just months ahead of the midterm election and as the Trump administration claims the U.S. voting system has been marred by widespread fraud and foreign influence.
In a speech delivered from the White House in July, Trump declared an “election security nightmare,” [publishing dozens of documents he said furnished proof](https://courthousenews.com/trump-claims-irrefutable-evidence-of-foreign-compromise-of-voter-rolls/) of Chinese meddling in the 2020 presidential election and efforts by Beijing to secure voter data from as many as 18 states.
“If you look at voting today, it’s in such bad shape in so many states, and we are committing to fix it,” the president said at the time.
Much of the information released by the White House, however, included details previously known to the intelligence community and the public. The documents contained information nearly identical to a 2021 report from the National Intelligence Council that concluded China did not interfere with election infrastructure, vote tabulation or the transmission of election results in the 2020 contest.
Trump lost that election to Joe Biden. Since then, he has claimed the election was “rigged” and attempted to overturn its results — an effort that culminated in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
In his second administration, Trump has championed voter ID legislation requiring people to show identification and proof of citizenship at the polls. The proposed measure, known as the Save America Act, has yet to garner enough support to pass both houses of Congress.
The president has also attempted to do away with mail-in voting. The Supreme Court on Monday [sided with Trump](http://Supreme Court frees Trump to enforce mail-in voting changes ahead of midterms) in a lawsuit challenging his executive order aimed at creating lists of U.S. citizens eligible to vote and restricting who can receive a mail ballot.
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