President Trump called for Republicans and the federal government to take control of local elections, as polls show Democrats likely to take back the House in November.
President Trump calls on Republicans to ‘nationalize’ elections on podcast
President Donald Trump appeared on The Dan Bongino Show and called on Republicans to take control of elections from each state.
- Steve Bannon said the federal government plans to have ICE agents at polling places for the 2026 midterm elections.
- Civil rights leaders and Democrats denounced these comments as anti-democratic and unconstitutional.
- Critics have suggested the comments may be an admission that Republicans are concerned about their chances in the November election.
One of President Donald Trump’s chief political planners has declared that the federal government plans to send U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to polling places during the November midterm elections.
Steve Bannon, a senior adviser in the first Trump administration, said on the Feb. 3 episode of the podcast “War Room” that “we’re going to have ICE surround the polls in November.”
“We’re not going to sit here and allow them to steal our country again,” he added. “And you can whine and cry and throw toys out of the pram all you want, but we will never again allow an election to be stolen.”
Immigration and Customs Enforcement did not respond to a request for comment on Bannon’s remarks.
The remarks could add fuel to speculation swirling among President Trump’s critics, who have warned that his administration intends to interfere in the upcoming fall election, which many expect will give Democrats control of at least one chamber of Congress.
A Harvard CAPS/Harris poll conducted on January 28 and 29 found that Democrats had widened their lead in the popular vote in Congress to 52% to 48%.
President Trump has continued to falsely claim that his loss to Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election was due to voter fraud, and the day before Bannon’s remarks, the president echoed similar sentiments on another podcast, saying the federal government should take control of elections from the states.
President Trump said on February 2: “Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over. We should take over voting in at least 15 of the most places.’ Republicans should nationalize voting. We have states that are very skewed.”
Leaders of both parties in Congress, including Senate Republican Leader John Thune of South Dakota, were quick to throw cold water on Trump’s comments, telling reporters that they were “not in favor of federalizing elections.” He also noted that the U.S. Constitution gives that authority to each state, leading to a more decentralized process overseen by county and city election officials covering thousands of voting districts across the country.
Democrats and civil rights leaders condemn President Trump’s call to nationalize elections
Bannon remains a key figure in the “Make America Great Again” movement, and his comments echo those of the president as he publicly toys with the idea of breaking other constitutional norms.
For example, in an October 2025 interview with The Economist, Mr. Bannon suggested that his former boss planned to defy the 22nd Amendment, which bars presidents from seeking a third term, after months of similar proposals by President Trump.
Levitt responds to Trump’s call to ‘nationalize’ elections
The spokesperson’s comments came after President Donald Trump called on Republicans to “nationalize” voting.
“Donald Trump is consolidating his power by trying to rig the election in his favor,” Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland said in a Feb. 3 post on X.
Several civil rights leaders issued a statement saying that any discussion of fundamental changes to U.S. election procedures is reckless.
“This is yet another reminder that the Trump administration is only trying to wear us down with deplorable and unconstitutional antics like this in hopes that we will grow tired and concede,” NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson said in a statement to USA TODAY.
Planned Parenthood Vote spokeswoman Angela Vázquez Giroux said these recent comments represent a shocking escalation by the president, but also a subtle acknowledgment of how bad Republicans think this fall’s congressional elections will be.
“If you’re confident in your party’s ability to win the hearts and minds of the American people, you don’t say you’re going to ‘nationalize’ elections or ‘hijack’ the voting process,” she said. “So what should we call President Trump’s latest authoritarian maneuver? It’s a clear admission that he and the Republican Party are frightened and desperate to hold on to power because they can’t win if they don’t.”
Democratic officials across the country are on high alert after the FBI recently executed a search warrant at an election center in Georgia. Georgia is a state that Trump lost in 2020 and where the president has repeatedly claimed, without evidence, that the election was stolen.
Others say the administration is pressuring leaders in Minnesota, where an ICE raid and killing of two Americans in January sparked civil unrest, to hand over voter rolls, including driver’s license numbers and some Social Security numbers.
“Fulfilling this common sense requirement will further ensure free and fair elections and strengthen confidence in the rule of law,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a Jan. 24 letter to Gov. Tim Walz.
