The city of Columbus has joined a lawsuit challenging a Trump administration policy conditioning anti-terrorism funding on changes to local election administration. The Trump administration wants to impose new proof of citizenship requirements, broader post-election audits, and a shift to hand-marked paper ballots.
Those changes align with provisions in the Save America Act and the Make Elections Great Again Act — White House priorities that have so far stalled out in Congress.
If states and local governments don’t comply with the administration’s demands, the Department of Homeland Security is threatening to withhold 20% of a Federal Emergency Management Agency grant helping agencies prevent or respond to terrorism.
In a press release announcing the changes, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin drew a straight line from election security to national security.
“Under President Trump’s leadership,” he said, “we are taking decisive action to protect election systems from threats like foreign interference, insider threats, and cyberattacks.”
Mullin added the new requirement will “preserve election integrity and ensure that Americans can trust the results.”
Those changes aren’t simple tweaks. Requiring documentary proof of citizenship could disenfranchise millions of eligible voters who simply don’t have their documents on hand. What’s more, the database federal officials want local officials to use is unreliable. The complaint cites an unrelated agreement with the State of California in which the Department of Homeland Security itself acknowledges an estimated 5-10% error rate in its database.
The complaint also notes in Nashville, Tennessee, one of the parties to the case, the “entire fleet” of ballot scanners would need to be reconfigured for hand-marked ballots, and they’d likely need more of them because it takes longer to scan the ballots. In Texas’ El Paso County, new printers alone could cost $3 million, and in Harris County, which includes Houston, officials warned it would not be possible to comply with a state law requiring ballot counting conclude within 24 hours.
The cities and counties challenging the new DHS policy insist Congress authorized the agency to protect critical infrastructure, not determine “who may vote, how ballots must be counted, or how states maintain their voter rolls.”
“The power to administer elections belongs to the states, subject only to conditions imposed by Congress — not the President, not the Secretary of Homeland Security, and not FEMA.”
The grant
Every year since 2002, Congress has set aside one or two billion dollars for the Homeland Security Grant Program. Some of that funding goes to states and some goes to specific urban areas. In the 2026 fiscal year, Ohio is set to receive $5.2 million, and the city of Columbus has a roughly $3.6 million allocation.
Absent election changes, Columbus would miss out on more than $700,000 under the new DHS policy.
The complaint details how past grants in Columbus have funded a bomb robot, hazmat equipment for SWAT teams, and chemical detection systems. The city is planning to use part of its upcoming allocation to cover anti-drone equipment and to make preparations for Columbus’ role as a soccer host city in the 2028 Olympics.
“That money has been authorized by Congress,” Klein said in an interview. “It is for a very specific purpose, and the Trump administration can’t come in and then say, ‘Well, you can’t have this money, or at least all of this money.’”
Other local leaders made similar arguments.
Harris County, Texas is the third most populous in the country; if it was a state, the complaint noted, Harris would be the 25th largest by population.
In a press release, Harris County Attorney Abbie Kamin said, “This is the kind of federal overreach we’ve come to expect from the Trump administration.”
The county is expecting to use grant funding to bolster its radio network for first responders and maintain a public emergency alert system.
In Tennessee, Nashville and Davidson County Director of Law Tyler Yarbro criticized the Trump administration for attempting to withhold funds “unless we implement wholly unnecessary and costly changes to our election procedures.”
Nashville is counting on grant funding to purchase an armored vehicle and ballistic vests, as well as bomb sniffing dogs, and equipment for helicopter rescues.
Federal response
Often federal agencies decline to speak about ongoing court cases, but in this instance, FEMA was willing to oblige.
In an email, a FEMA spokesperson wrote, “Election security is national security, and protecting our critical infrastructure remains a top priority for the Trump Administration. Concerns over voting processes, data security, and registration practices have made it clear that action is required.”
“This partisan pushback is nothing new,” the statement said. “We fully expected opposition to common-sense measures designed to protect election security and safeguard the integrity of American democracy.”
Klein isn’t surprised either. This isn’t the first time, he said, that the Trump administration has attempted to link two unrelated programs to gain political leverage. He pointed to a previous lawsuit in which federal officials tried to condition Department of Transportation funding on local DEI policies and sanctuary city status.
“What does paving streets in Linden or the Hilltop have to do with that analysis?” Klein said. “Nothing. And this is really no different.”
Follow Ohio Capital Journal Reporter Nick Evans on X or on Bluesky.
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