The Department of Homeland Security is investigating voter records across all 50 states in a campaign that could affect hundreds of thousands of people, according to a whistleblower report released by Senate Democrats. The report alleges that DHS agents are being instructed to identify noncitizens and naturalized citizens who may have registered or voted before becoming citizens. The review, known as the “Unlawful Voter Initiative,” was launched in late August and assigned to a fraud-detection unit within U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. According to lawyers representing the whistleblower, agents were given only a few weeks to examine thousands of records and create law-enforcement files, known as TECS records, for people believed to have voted unlawfully. Agents were reportedly expected to review at least 40 people a day while checking citizenship, identity, registration and voting information. The whistleblower said the pace and quality of the data could lead to lawful voters being wrongly flagged. The report also alleges that agents were not always told where some information came from and were directed to proceed even when they believed federal data was too unreliable to justify opening a file. Those designations could have consequences beyond an election investigation, including increased scrutiny during border crossings or additional DHS inquiries. The training materials allegedly told agents to use state voter-registration portals while posing as the people being investigated. When agents raised concerns that the practice could violate state law, supervisors reportedly told them they would not be personally liable if the searches were conducted as part of their official duties and properly documented. California Sen. Alex Padilla, one of the Democrats criticizing the program, said the initiative was not genuinely aimed at election security. “The truth is, this has nothing to do with protecting the integrity of our elections,” Padilla said at a news conference. He accused the administration of using questionable evidence to intimidate voters, disenfranchise eligible Americans and cast doubt on future election results. Senate Democrats sent Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin a letter Sunday demanding that the operation end. DHS rejected the characterization of the investigation as rushed or unprofessional. A department spokesperson said agents were conducting ordinary law-enforcement work and argued that identifying noncitizens who vote is necessary to protect election integrity. The department said it had cross-referenced publicly available state voter rolls with information about noncitizens in federal systems. The whistleblower report, however, says the training materials acknowledge known gaps and accuracy problems in those citizenship records. In one training video, an instructor reportedly suggested that missing information could be added later. Studies have found that noncitizen voting is exceedingly rare. The DHS investigation comes as President Donald Trump has made finding evidence of widespread noncitizen voting a major administration priority and as Democrats anticipate a possible change in control of at least one chamber of Congress in the fall. The whistleblower is represented by Democracy Defenders, a group that has challenged several Trump administration policies in court. The allegations have not been independently adjudicated, and DHS has not specifically addressed each claim in the report.