Trump still pushes for control of elections
Advocates worry despite mail-in voting decision
by: Joey Meyer
and Sarah D. Wire
USA Today
WASHINGTON - In his second term, President Donald Trump has moved aggressively to assert federal control over elections. And in the aftermath of the Supreme Court's September 14 [2026] ruling blocking ballots, Trump and his supporters are now expected to focus on other parts of that broad campaign in the less than 50 days before the election.
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The Constitution grants states authority over election administration, but some voting rights experts say Trump's moves are aimed at gaining a political advantage over Democrats and retaining Republican control of Congress.
..... The Supreme Court decision was a win for a group of Democratic-led states and voting organization that challenged the Trump administration effort to have the U.S. Postal Service play a role in deciding who receives a mail-in ballot, saying it was untested and could lead to potentially millions of valid ballots being rejected.
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Voting rights activists are pleased with the decision but are worried about the damage the weeks of confusion caused - and that it's just part of a broader campaign that will continue until voters go to the polls.
..... "Every lawless gambit has failed, but that desperation means he may try something extreme," Lauren Groh-Wargo, CEO of Fair Fight Action, told USA Today. "He will fail again - the courts have held the line and organizations are preparing legal challenges and coordinating with election officials to be ready."
..... The white House and justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment about what potential next steps they might take . The Trump administration and Republican leaders in Congress have said the changes are necessary to secure elections. At a White House briefing on September 15 [2026] Attorney General Todd Blanche said the Supreme Court decision doesn't affect ongoing Justice Department investigations into illegal voting.
..... "Of course we're going to comply with the Supreme Court's decision," Blanche said. "That doesn't mean that we're not going to do everything in this administration that we can to make sure that three are free and fair elections. ... We're not going to stop the work that we're doing.
..... Hameet Dhillon, assistant attorney general for civil rights, said in a recent interview hat the Trump administration is battling what she called judicial "lawfare" nationwide as it races to enforce new restitutions on voting by mail before the November [2026] election.
..... In recent months, the administration has pushed to gain, or tighten, control over the upcoming midterm elections, including by limiting main-in ballots, demanding voter rolls form states, trying to cerate a federal list of U.S. citizens eligible to vote in each state, and using federal citizenship records and other data to challenge voter rolls.
..... Federal judges in at least 11 states have halted 23 lawsuits brought by the administration to force states to turn over voter rolls, according to Andrew Garber of the Brennan Center for Justice at new York University School of Law.
..... "The courts are rejecting all of these illegitimate efforts," said Norm Eisen, executive chair of the States United Democracy Center. "It has been a stunning losing streak for Donald Trump.
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Administration officials also have sought to cast doubt on voting machines' reliability and to pressure local officials by weakening election-security support systems hat states usually rely on, such as the U.S. election Assistance commission, and installing loyalists in key posts.
..... "Part of this is obviously a pretext for a larger effort to say you can't trust our elections, particularly if the administration doesn't like how November [2026] turns out for them," said Ben Hovland, a fellow with the Center for American Progress and a former commissioner with the Election Assistance Commission.
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The Trump administration is working in various ways to gain federal control of elections
* Voting Rolls: The Justice Depart4emnt especially under Dhillion, has been aggressively pressuring - and suing - states for there private voter data and other data. while some states have voluntarily provided information, the DOJ has lost every case it has brought in trying to force other states to comply.
* Citizenship checks: The Department of Homeland Security and other agencies, led by Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, are trying to crunch all sorts of federal data - and merge them int the SAVE database at DHS - to flag what they allege are supposed non-citizens voters, despite no historical evidence of widespread fraud.
* Voting machines: Federal officials including Trump-appointed intelligence officials, and some supportive states officials are openly questioning whether voting systems commonly used for decades can be trusted, feeding into doubts about election technology that Trump and his supporters have fanned without evidence since 2020.
* Election Security: The administration has made huge cuts to federal coordination funding, laid off election security experts in multiple agencies, and reduced support for states dealing with foreign interference and cyber threats. DHS, the Office or the Direct of National Intelligence and other key federal agencies have eliminated or downsized there specialized units to combat "foreign Maligan Influence" from foreign governments and non-state actors.
* Personnel: The administration has appointed people who question the validity of election results and other loyalists to key posts while also pushing out career officials, which many voting rights experts say has weakened the kind of election integrity guardrails that held fast in 2020.
* Pressure Campaigns: Trump administration officials have threatened jail time, criminal charges and the loss of Federal Emergency Management Agency and other federal funding to force states and local election officials to comply with these efforts.
..... "Surely someone in the white House knows that most of the stuff that they are trying around elections, trying to interfere with elections, cannot survive judicial review, and yet persist with it, and that is to plant these seeds of doubt," said Hannah Fried, co founder and CEO of All voting Is Local; and a former top "voter protection" official for Democrats, including President Barack Obama.