Three National Guard members — part of the force President Trump controls in Washington, D.C. — were filmed standing in front of a ballot drop box just as the city was getting ready to vote.

The video was posted on Thursday, October 8, 2026, by D.C. political and legal commentator Bryan K. Randolph, Common Dreams reported. It shows the troops at a drop box outside the Foggy Bottom Metro station on George Washington University's campus. Randolph said they left a few minutes after he started recording.

The D.C. Board of Elections told Common Dreams it had received complaints about Guard personnel near the drop box, was raising them directly with the Guard, and had asked for limits on where the Guard can be placed near drop boxes and voting locations. The military command that runs the Guard in D.C. didn't respond.

The law is clear about troops at the polls

Federal law makes it a crime for anyone in the military or federal service to bring troops or armed men to any place where an election is held, unless it's to fight off armed enemies of the United States. The statute was written long before drop boxes existed, so it doesn't name them — but legal experts argue a ballot box where people are casting votes is exactly the kind of place the law protects.

The point of that law is simple. Voters shouldn't have to walk past soldiers to cast a ballot.

"Armed troops do not belong near ballot boxes," said Monica Hopkins, executive director of the ACLU of D.C.

This isn't the first time

In June, D.C.'s delegate to Congress, Eleanor Holmes Norton, demanded answers from the Guard after videos showed Guard members gathered near ballot boxes. One person in the footage reportedly said they "had not received instructions to avoid the vicinity of drop boxes." Norton wrote that "at a minimum, such conduct creates the appearance of voter intimidation." She noted the president, not a governor, controls the D.C. Guard. Her release said she had not gotten a response.

Four months later, the troops were at a drop box again.

Trump sent the Guard into D.C. in the summer of 2025. A federal judge ruled the deployment unlawful, but an appeals court put that ruling on hold, so the troops are still there. Republican governors have sent their own troops to help — Brad Little sent Idaho National Guard troops to Washington in February without announcing it.

Republicans on this site have floated the same thing

D.C. isn't a one-off idea. Several Republicans running this year have openly talked about putting armed federal forces near voters:

• In Georgia, Mike Collins said sending federal troops to polling places is "fine with me".
• Also in Georgia, Rick Jackson told a supporter that Brian Kemp will "get the National Guard" for the election — though the governor's office indicated there were no plans for it.
• In Maine, Bobby Charles said he'd ask Trump's border czar to put ICE agents at voting booths.

What we know

On October 8, 2026, three National Guard members under Trump's command were filmed at a ballot drop box in Washington, D.C., as voting was about to begin, even though federal law bars troops at places where elections are held. D.C.'s elections board has asked the Guard to limit where its troops are posted near drop boxes and voting sites, and Norton said in June she'd gotten no answers after a similar incident.

Source

‘Affront to Democracy’: Trump's National Guard Troops Seen in Front of Ballot Box in DC — Common Dreams, October 9, 2026