A former Homeland Security official is warning that one of the most dangerous election fights of Donald Trump’s second term may be about to begin — and at the center of it is a man from the president’s distant past.

Miles Taylor, a former senior DHS official and longtime Trump critic, sounded the alarm Thursday over what he described as an imminent scheme to “hijack the midterm vote.” The warning focused on Peter Ticktin, an 80-year-old Florida lawyer who first met Trump in the 1950s at the New York Military Academy and has reportedly remained in the president’s orbit decades later.

Taylor’s concern is not that Ticktin is merely spreading conspiracy theories.

It is that Trump may listen.

According to Taylor, Ticktin has been pushing the president to declare a national emergency based on unsupported claims of foreign interference in the 2020 election. CNN has reported that Ticktin helped draft an executive order that would declare such an emergency, raising fears among critics that the White House could attempt to place the 2026 midterm elections under federal control.

The idea sounds extreme.

Taylor says that is exactly why it should not be ignored.

“I know what you’re thinking, because I thought it too,” Taylor wrote in a new Substack analysis. “This man sounds like a quack. Well, yes. He sure seems to be a quack. And that’s actually why I’m taking him seriously.”

That sentence captured the chilling logic behind Taylor’s warning. In Trump’s political universe, ideas once dismissed as fringe can move quickly from the margins to the Oval Office — especially when they flatter the president’s grievances, promise revenge or offer a path to retain power.

Ticktin’s theory, according to Taylor, is built around explosive and unsubstantiated claims involving foreign election interference, Venezuela and the 2020 election. Taylor wrote that Ticktin believes proof of a vast conspiracy could emerge if Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro ends up in federal custody and “starts talking.”

Some have speculated, Taylor said, that the Trump administration may try to pressure Maduro into validating the narrative in exchange for leniency.

That claim remains unproven. But Taylor warned that the deeper danger lies in how such theories might be used.

A president does not need a proven conspiracy to create chaos.

He needs a pretext.

Taylor also wrote that Ticktin has claimed Democrats are plotting to steal enough seats in November to impeach both Trump and Vice President JD Vance, then install House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries in the Oval Office.

To many readers, the theory may sound fantastical. But Taylor argued that Trump has already shown a willingness to embrace outlandish claims when they serve his political interests.

That is why the reported draft executive order matters.

If Trump declares a national emergency over election claims, critics fear it could become the legal and political foundation for federal intervention in the midterms. Such a move would ignite an immediate constitutional crisis and likely trigger lawsuits, emergency court battles and mass political resistance.

Taylor’s message was simple: do not wait until it happens.

“If this guy, Ticktin, wants Trump to declare a ‘national emergency,’ let’s be prepared for the president to declare one,” Taylor wrote, “and be ready ourselves to say within seconds that it’s a farce.”

The warning comes as Trump has already pushed to restrict mail-in voting and continues to cast doubt on election systems. His allies have repeatedly claimed that Democrats plan to cheat, steal or manipulate future elections, even without evidence sufficient to support those accusations.

For Taylor, the pattern is familiar.

He argues that Trump will likely dispute the outcome of the midterms if Republicans lose, even if the result is decisive. He also warned that Trump may try to prevent a peaceful transfer of power to the political opposition.

“After all, he’s done it before,” Taylor wrote. “But this time we’re better prepared to fight it.”

The phrase pointed directly back to the aftermath of the 2020 election, when Trump refused to accept his defeat and his supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. For critics like Taylor, that history is not background noise.

It is the blueprint.

The 2026 midterms are already expected to be among the most volatile in modern American history. Democrats are trying to reclaim power in Congress. Republicans are defending Trump’s agenda. And the president continues to frame electoral defeat not as a possible democratic outcome, but as evidence of fraud.

That mindset makes any emergency-election theory dangerous.

For Trump’s supporters, Taylor’s warning will likely be dismissed as alarmism from a former official who has long opposed the president. They may argue that election integrity concerns deserve investigation and that federal action could be justified if foreign interference is proven.

But Taylor’s argument is that the facts are not driving the process.

The scheme, he warns, may be driven by conspiracy, loyalty and a desire to control the outcome before voters have their say.

The most unsettling part of the story is not that an old friend of Trump is pushing a wild theory.

It is that he has reportedly been close enough to the center of power to put it on paper.

And in a presidency where impossible ideas can become policy with shocking speed, Taylor says the country must be ready before the order is signed — not after.