There is a rumor circulating that the Trump administration might send U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) officials to polling stations on Election Day. Some Democrat politicians have already gone on the record to say that they are opposed to the idea because it might intimidate voters. Wait a minute–only American citizens are supposed to be voting. Why would they be intimidated by ICE?

On August 14th, Newsbusters posted an article explaining the possible origins of the rumor.

The article reports:

Former CNN host Jim Acosta hates conspiracy theories unless, of course, he happens to be the one peddling them. On his Tuesday Substack podcast, Acosta mused, without evidence, that the Trump Administration could send ICE to polling stations to intimidate Latinos into not voting.

During a discussion with former Ohio Democratic Party Chairman and “democracy warrior” David Pepper, Acosta lamented, “The thing that you just mentioned a few moments ago about putting police officers or troops outside polling stations. It does remind me of something I saw—a very disturbing story in The Washington Post today that says that ‘the Trump administration is evaluating plans that would establish a ‘Domestic Civil Disturbance Quick Reaction Force’ composed of hundreds of National Guard troops tasked with rapidly deploying into American cities facing protests or other unrest.’ This is according to ‘internal Pentagon documents reviewed by The Washington Post.’”

Showing a lack of originality, Acosta proclaimed, “This is just nutty, dystopian, Handmaid’s Tale-type stuff.”

Where were these people when the New Black Panthers were standing outside a polling place with billy clubs in Philadelphia in 2008? Just for the record, the charges of voter intimidation against the New Black Panthers were dismissed by the Obama Justice Department in May 2009.

Current reporting says that there will not be ICE agents at polling places.