Voting officials fear DHS may actually be a threat to elections this year

Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin speaks during a June 11 press conference. Oliver Contreras/AFP via Getty Images hide caption

Gary Berntsen is convinced Venezuela stole the 2020 U.S. election.

That myth has been debunked numerous times, including as part of Fox News' 2023 $787 million settlement with voting machine company Dominion, but Berntsen, a former CIA operative, has been pushing it for years.

"One of the things that we learned is there's 14 different technical ways that you can steal an election," Berntsen explained in an interview in the fall with conservative podcaster Lara Logan.

But ahead of the 2024 election, Berntsen says he couldn't get anyone to listen to him. Not the FBI. Not the media.

Finally, he went to Congress, where he says he was similarly rebuffed by almost everyone, including Republicans. Except one.

"One politician in America was not afraid," Berntsen told Logan. "It was Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma."

Allies of Berntsen say Mullin — then a U.S. senator, now the head of the Department of Homeland Security — brokered a meeting at Mar-a-Lago so Berntsen could brief President Trump's team on conspiracy theories about Venezuelan interference in elections.