A well-known election denier who curried favor with President Donald Trump for providing false information about the 2020 presidential election has been appointed to a senior position overseeing all U.S. election infrastructure in the Department of Homeland Security.
Heather Honey, 54, has devoted years of her life to disputing election results in key battleground states, such as Arizona and her home state of Pennsylvania. Through her various companies, Honey has flooded local officials and misrepresented voter data in reports — part of an effort to sow skepticism about elections that fail to go MAGA Republicans’ way.
Most notably, it was Honey’s election research that misrepresented voter data in 2020 and claimed Pennsylvania had more votes than voters — a false statement later repeated by Trump at his “Stop the Steal” rally on January 6, 2021.
Honey also memorably served as a witness for Kari Lake, the failed Arizona gubernatorial candidate, who unsuccessfully tried to sue for election fraud in 2022. A judge ultimately dismissed Lake’s lawsuit.
Now, Honey is working as the deputy assistant secretary for Election Integrity, according to the department’s Office of Strategy, Policy, and Plans organizational leadership chart.
Her position, which did not exist in the Biden administration, reports to David Harvilicz, the assistant secretary for Cyber, Infrastructure, Risk and Resilience.
It’s unclear what duties Honey will be fulfilling in her role. Local and state officials are primarily responsible for running elections in each state, but DHS assists by providing cybersecurity assistance, monitoring for threats, and coordinating between federal and state partners.
The Independent asked the Department of Homeland Security for comment.
Honey has founded multiple companies dedicated to investigations and elections, including Haystack Investigations, which requested information for all 2.1 million ballots cast in Maricopa County, Arizona in 2022; PA Fair Elections, which challenged the eligibility of thousands of Pennsylvania residents; VerityVote, which released a report falsely claiming Pennsylvania sent more than 200,000 “unverified” mail ballots; and the Election Research Institute, which recently released a report claiming Iran interfered with Alaska’s elections in 2020.
Honey’s appointment comes as Trump is attempting to change the election process by getting rid of mail-in voting and voting machines before the 2026 midterm elections.
Although both methods of voting are widely used and considered secure, Trump has cast doubt on their integrity. Both methods were used during the 2020 election, which former president Joe Biden won, but Trump claims was “stolen” from him through mass voter fraud despite little evidence of such.
Upon hearing of her appointment, Lake wrote on X, “Congratulations, Heather Honey. This is incredible news.”
