Politics
DHS official promises election officials that ICE will not be at polling places
A top Department of Homeland Security official vowed during a private call with election officials Wednesday that immigration officers will not be stationed at polling places in November amid Democratic warnings about interference in the midterms by the federal government.
Heather Honey, the department’s deputy assistant secretary for election integrity, dismissed as “disinformation” any fears that officers from Immigration Customs and Enforcement would be deployed to the polls as part of President Donald Trump’s ongoing mass deportation campaign.
“Any suggestion that ICE is going to be present at polling places is simply disinformation,” Honey said, according to four people on the call who were granted anonymity to discuss it. “There will be no ICE presence at polling locations.”
Honey’s words, and her background as a denier of the 2020 election, did not eliminate fears from Democrats, who have been battling with the Trump administration over election issues, especially the Justice Department’s requests for private voter rolls.
“I can’t depend on an election denier like that for the truth under any circumstances,” said Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes, a Democrat who was on the call. “So, they need to get better spokespeople who actually have some integrity.”
The sparring over ICE officers at polling places reflects Democratic fears that the federal government will insert itself into the midterms and as Trump himself has said his administration “ought to nationalize the voting.”
Administration officials from four departments — the Election Assistance Commission, Department of Homeland Security, Justice Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation — were on the call, which was organized for a routine discussion of federal assistance ahead of November.
Fontes said little substance was shared on the call outside of the commitment to not having ICE at polling places.
“I really don’t know exactly what the purpose of this call was other than window dressing,” he said.
Another person on the call said it was the latest example of “conflicting messages” coming from the Trump administration on election issues.
“They want both to intimidate and control the states and to try to demonstrate business as usual, so they’re sending very conflicting messages to all of us about what they want their role to be in 2026,” the person said.
“It felt like kind of a cover your butt kind of call, so they have now checked the box that they have met with election officials from across the country,” a third person on the call said.
OTTAWA — Mark Carney may be Canada’s loudest booster at the World Cup, but some of his countrymen fear he may be hurting more than helping — because he always does when it comes to sports.
In March 2025, the new prime minister joined the Edmonton Oilers for a pre-game skate. That night the Oilers fell to the Winnipeg Jets, followed by a wave of injuries on the team. Former Oiler and “Spittin’ Chiclets” podcast host Ryan Whitney took to X: “The Carney Curse is real for Edmonton. What the hell just happened. Guy is on the ice with the Oil this morning and now everyone is injured.”
Now some Canadians are worried that their prime minister has brought the “Carney Curse” to the World Cup, blaming him for Canada’s defeat against Switzerland on Wednesday. His country’s only only goal coincided with a moment that Carney left his box seat at Vancouver’s BC Place.
For a brief, glorious moment last week, the Ottawa fishbowl wondered if the curse had been broken. Carney skipped Canada’s World Cup opener against Bosnia-Herzegovina. But then, after days of anxious whispers over whether he’d jinx the squad, the prime minister witnessed Canada thrash Qatar. If Canada had beaten or tied the Swiss, the team could’ve played as many as two elimination games in Vancouver. With the loss, they fell to runner-up — and a knockout-round game in Los Angeles against South Africa on Sunday.
Canada’s men’s soccer team joins an ever-growing list of inadvertent “victims” of prime-ministerial fanhood, including: the Toronto Blue Jays, who lost the World Series after Carney visited the team; the Canadian women’s rugby team, for whom he traveled to the United Kingdom to cheer on at the World Cup last summer; and the Montreal Canadiens, whom he dubbed “Canada’s team” during the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas danced with Netherlands fans to their famous song “Links Rechts” ahead of the Orange Walk in Kansas City’s Power & Light District on Thursday. The Dutch supporters — along with the Scots and the Norwegians — have been some of the most exuberant in backing their team around the U.S. One local told the Kansas City Star that the experience topped a Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl parade.
Some of soccer’s biggest names have to come to play at the World Cup: Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappé, Erling Haaland, Vinícius Júnior and now even Cristiano Ronaldo have left their mark on the score sheet.
But one key player who loomed over just about every step of pre-tournament preparations has been notably invisible: Donald Trump.
Pre-tournament fears that the American president would trample on the soccer jamboree have, so far, proved largely unfounded after the first two weeks of competition. Trump has yet to attend a match, and even as the U.S. team mounts its best World Cup performance in decades he has done little to claim the success as his own.
Aside from persistent complications surrounding the Iran squad’s entry and exit to the U.S. for games, and the ban on a Somali referee from entering the country before the tournament started, political incidents involving the Trump administration and soccer — or leaders of other World Cup countries, including the neighboring co-hosts with whom he often spars — have been few and far between.
No ICE arrests around matches. No heavy-handed policing like soccer fans sometimes suffer in Western Europe. No beef between Trump and Democratic leaders of cities and states where some of the tournament’s highest-profile matches have been played.
As one European-based senior sports executive told Blue Light News last year about the administration and the World Cup, “Why would they want to f—k it up?”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio attended the USMNT’s opener against Paraguay in Los Angeles, while Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — along with other senior Cabinet officials — was at the American match vs. Australia in Seattle. Though Trump himself hasn’t been to a game yet, he did send the U.S. squad a message of support at the start of the tournament.
In an interview last week with Blue Light News, Massachusetts Democratic Gov. Maura Healey said her administration had worked with the U.S. government “around transportation funding, security funding. That’s the way it should be. There should be that kind of work and coordination.”
Trump allies are on the same page as the tournament progresses serenely through the group stage, beyond continued griping about high ticket prices and transport to and from some stadiums.
“It’s been really good to see the coordination, certainly from a law enforcement perspective,” said Andrew Giuliani, head of the White House’s World Cup task force, as he praised cooperation with police and security services in blue states like New York, New Jersey and California, where the administration doesn’t “agree eye to eye with the mayors and the governors.”
“It’s fun to see moments where the country can come together as well, and I think this is one of those great moments over our 250th birthday where that can happen,” he added.
This week, FIFA chief Gianni Infantino confirmed what many have expected: Trump plans to attend the final on July 19 and help present the winner’s trophy. Can a president who loves the spotlight stay away til then?
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