Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin sent letters on Aug. 18, 2026, to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, asking them to put in writing that the Department of Defense will not send federal troops to the polls or seize election materials during the November 2026 midterm elections.
Her request was specific: that “the Department of Defense will not send Federal troops to the polls or to seize election materials of any kind.” No deployment has happened. Slotkin, a Democrat and a former CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) analyst and Pentagon official, wants a formal written commitment that the Department of Defense will not send federal troops to the polls or seize election materials.
Key facts
- Who: Sen. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), a former CIA analyst and Pentagon official
- What: Letters sent Aug. 18, 2026, to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine
- Request: A written commitment that federal troops won’t go to polling places or seize election materials
- Status: No deployment has occurred; neither official had responded as of August 19, 2026
- Also this week: The Justice Department is sending about 1,000 poll watchers to elections this year
Why she’s asking now
In the days before her letters, Trump reportedly told conservative commentator Wayne Allyn Root that “stranger things have happened,” after Root raised the idea of Trump declaring a national emergency to take federal control of the midterms. It’s not clear from that exchange alone whether Trump was seriously entertaining the idea or just brushing off the question, but Slotkin’s letter cited the remark as one more reason for concern. Her letter also points to Trump’s broader refusal to rule out sending troops. Earlier this year, when a PBS NewsHour correspondent asked him directly whether he would send the National Guard or ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) agents to polling locations, Trump answered, “I’d do anything necessary to make sure we have honest elections. We have to have honest elections.”
In the letter, Slotkin argued Trump is “laying the breadcrumbs to be able to say the day after the election that he didn’t really lose the House or he didn’t really lose the Senate.” She pointed to past episodes as reasons for concern: Trump’s contemplating the seizure of voting machines after his 2020 election loss, National Guard deployments to U.S. cities that Democrats opposed, and the deployment of active-duty Marines to Los Angeles in 2025 during an immigration enforcement operation.
What the administration has said
White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles has previously called the idea of using the military to suppress voting “categorically false, will not happen.” But Trump himself has not ruled out sending troops or federal agents to polling places. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said she had not heard Trump discuss sending immigration agents to polling sites, but she did not rule it out when asked directly, and Hegseth himself, pressed earlier this year on whether he would follow an order to seize ballots, called the question a “gotcha hypothetical” but said only, “I’ve never been ordered to do anything illegal, and I won’t.”
As of August 19, 2026, neither Hegseth nor Caine has responded to Slotkin’s letter. The Pentagon said it would reply to her directly, the way it handles all correspondence from Congress; the Joint Chiefs of Staff did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
What the law actually allows
Federal law bars deploying armed federal forces to election sites unless it is necessary to “repel armed enemies of the United States.” If the military were to become involved with polling places at all, it would most likely be through the National Guard — which is normally controlled by state governors, not the federal government. Separately, Senate Democrats have introduced legislation that would require Congress to approve any deployment of federal troops to polling places before it could happen.
The letters land alongside a separate move by the Department of Justice, which said this week it is sending about 1,000 poll watchers to elections this year, after already sending roughly 75 to primary elections in heavily Democratic cities. Poll watchers are not troops and carry different legal rules.
Where it stands
Slotkin’s letters are a request for a written guarantee that the Department of Defense will not send federal troops to the polls or seize election materials during the November 2026 midterms — a guarantee the Pentagon and the Joint Chiefs had not given as of August 19, 2026.