Today on Lawfare: June 3, 2026

From Lawfare's Editorial Team.

Compiled by Marissa Wang.

Articles

Rules of Engagement When the Troops Appear at Polling Sites

Dan Maurer examined the possibility that the Trump administration could deploy federal troops or immigration agents near polling places and argued that state election officials should proactively educate voters on their rights and the legal limits on military and law enforcement. Maurer contended that clear public “rules of engagement” could reduce intimidation and potential confrontations if armed federal personnel appear at election sites.

Open, noncoercive, and safe elections are a hallmark of a healthy democracy. Today, those characteristics are in jeopardy. In January, President Trump boasted of his administration’s first year back in office and said, “When you think of it, we shouldn’t even have an election.” Speaking on former Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino’s podcast in early February, Trump claimed that illegal immigrants “were brought to our country to vote, and they vote illegally.” He continued, “The Republicans should say, we should take over the voting in at least 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.” And in September 2025, Trump blamed “radical left democrats” for political violence and designated “antifa” activities as “domestic terrorism.”

These three statements come amid a campaign by popular MAGA influencers and some members of Congress urging Trump to deploy forces at polling sites. The fact that 46 percent of the public supports the idea of the National Guard monitoring or patrolling the ballot provides the administration enough of a basis to claim it has a “mandate” to do so.

The Remediation Gap in Civilian Camera Security

Branko Ruzic explained that if the U.S. became the target of the increasingly common exploitation of civilian internet-connected cameras by foreign states for intelligence gathering, the current framework of U.S. cybersecurity policy would not be equipped to handle the security risks posed by pre-existing civilian camera networks.

Hacking civilian cameras is now a recurring feature of war. The question for the United States is whether its legal framework can compel remediation of the millions of exploitable devices already deployed across U.S. cities. A walk through the existing statutory landscape suggests the answer is no, and that the authority architecture capable of changing that answer would introduce risks of its own.

Lawfare Daily: Pope Leo XIV Takes on Silicon Valley with Christopher Hale and Renée DiResta: Renée DiResta sat down with Christopher Hale to discuss Pope Leo XIV’s entrance into the artificial intelligence (AI) debate, what it means to “disarm” AI, the perspective of the Pope’s new encyclical, Silicon Valley’s response, and more.

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