State officials say the Trump administration has been absent on election security

Source: NBC News

Feb. 9, 2026, 5:00 AM EST


State election officials got an unusual invitation from the Trump administration last week: a late February call about midterm preparations organized by the FBI. The surprise email came at a tense moment. The Justice Department has sued dozens of states for unredacted voter rolls, the FBI raided an Atlanta-area elections office, and President Donald Trump has called for nationalizing at least some elections.

Some state election chiefs said the invitation was also the first time they have heard from anyone in this Trump administration about election security in months — or ever. Seven Trump officials — including as many as three Cabinet secretaries — were expected to appear at a National Association of Secretaries of State (NASS) conference in Washington, D.C., last month, but ultimately just one White House aide showed up.

“Given what has happened over the last two weeks, the drama that occurred at NASS, and then to arbitrarily just send out an email with a predetermined date and time with everybody’s emails exposed, saying get on this call,” said Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar, a Democrat, “my response was — [ I ] wrote back to them immediately, like, is this real?”

Nine secretaries of state at the annual NASS conference, which took place before the FBI’s briefing invitation, said in interviews that they’d had little contact with the second Trump administration, which gutted the federal agency charged with helping states secure their elections last year.

Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/state-officials-say-trump-administration-election-security-rcna257031