New York Times: “A case about mail voting that will be the subject of oral arguments before the Supreme Court Monday in some ways boils down to a simple question. What is the definition of Election Day?”
“But the potential political consequences of the case, which was brought by allies of President Trump who want to bar states from counting mailed ballots that arrive after Election Day, are far more tangible.”
Wall Street Journal: “President Trump has demanded that the GOP-controlled Senate vote to end most mail-in voting. One big problem: Many red-leaning states have embraced the practice, putting lawmakers in a tough spot.”
“Trump allies are aiming to tack mail-in voting limits onto the SAVE America Act, which would require people to prove U.S. citizenship to register to vote, among other new rules. The measure is opposed by Democrats, and the president’s insistence on adding mail-in voting to the mix has further complicated the politics.”
“President Donald Trump has ramped up pressure on Republicans in recent weeks to pass the Save America Act, a bill that would require people to provide proof of citizenship to register to vote and to show photo identification at the polls, among other voting restrictions,” the Washington Post reports.
“But the bill might not help Republicans as much as Trump thinks. It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections. Requiring Americans to prove they are citizens when they register to vote, in an effort to root out the extremely rare cases of noncitizen voting, would throw up roadblocks to the polls for millions of eligible voters across the political spectrum, and in some cases could hurt Republicans more.”
New York Times: “Since returning to office, Mr. Trump has tried to bend election mechanics to his will, kicking off a redistricting war with little precedent, bombastically calling for elections to be “nationalized” and having the F.B.I. seize materials from the 2020 election in Georgia and Arizona. Outside the spotlight, his administration has effectively gutted election security infrastructure that Mr. Trump himself created in his first term, including CISA’s election team and a program responsible for sharing threat intelligence with state and local officials.”
“With less than eight months until the 2026 midterms, Republican and Democratic lawmakers and election officials across the country say that much of CISA’s support has disappeared, forcing them to prepare for an election without the agency as a trusted partner. They worry that elections will now be more susceptible to cyberattacks and foreign influence campaigns.”
Mississippi rolled out a controversial method statewide last July to perform the routine job of checking voters’ residences: using unverified credit data to remove 50,000 voters from the voting rolls, Mississippi Today reports.
“Using the credit data, which comes from the consumer-reporting giant Experian, marks a departure from the verified government data that Mississippi and most other states have historically relied on to find out when voters move.”
New York Times: “Facing the possibility of big losses for Republicans in the midterm elections, President Trump has reiterated his unfounded assertions of electoral fraud. He has also begun speaking of the need to ‘nationalize’ elections, and for Republican officials to ‘take over’ voting procedures in parts of the country.”
“This rhetoric is often vague, coming across as a hint of plan, rather than an actual one.”
“But a map of potential targets may be coming into focus and includes the swing states Michigan, Georgia, North Carolina and Arizona. Voting experts, government officials and others have identified a host of conditions that could make those places ripe for meddling from the Trump administration or its allies.”
“Several high-ranking federal election officials attended a summit last week at which prominent figures who worked to overturn Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 election pressed the president to declare a national emergency to take over this year’s midterms,” ProPublica reports.
Washington Post: “Pro-Trump activists who say they are in coordination with the White House are circulating a 17-page draft executive order that claims China interfered in the 2020 election as a basis to declare a national emergency that would unlock extraordinary presidential power over voting.”
Marc Novicoff: “For decades, the politics of voter-ID battles were based on a simple premise: The voters most likely to be screened out by such restrictions were probably Democrats.”
“In 2024, however, that fact stopped being true. Trump beat Kamala Harris among voters who didn’t regularly participate in elections. In the low-turnout, off-cycle elections that have happened since then, Democrats have overperformed dramatically, suggesting that their advantage with the most educated, plugged-in voters remains strong.”
“In other words, the politics of voter ID have not caught up to its new partisan implications. Making voting more difficult would most likely hurt Republicans’ chances, yet they’re pushing hard to make that happen; meanwhile, Democrats, who insist that Trump and a MAGA Congress are existential threats to American democracy, refuse on principle to help Republicans sabotage themselves.”
“Ahead of the midterm elections, an emboldened President Trump has shown an increased eagerness to leverage the full investigative, prosecutorial and legislative powers of the federal government to bend election mechanics to his will,” the New York Times reports.
“With his words and deeds, the president — who pushed to overturn his 2020 defeat but declared his 2024 victory legitimate — appears to be undermining Americans’ trust that the midterms will be free and fair.”
“As the political environment darkens for his party, Mr. Trump is again warning Republicans that Democrats are going to rig the results. At the same time, he is taking actions that make Democrats fear that Republicans are actually going to subvert the election.”
“The SAVE America Act to require proof of citizenship nationwide to register to vote and overhaul voting laws has now topped 50 votes in the Republican-controlled Senate,” NBC News reports.
“The bill is supported by President Donald Trump and passed the House last week, meaning the Senate’s 60-vote filibuster rule is the only thing standing in the way of it becoming law.”
“The tally guarantees a battle over the bill on the Senate floor as Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) has promised a vote. But he warned last week that there are ‘not even close’ to enough votes for getting rid of the filibuster, despite Trump’s calls to do so.”
“President Donald Trump wants to end mail-in voting as Americans know it — but congressional Republicans aren’t answering his call,” Politico reports.
“Trump has long railed against the expansion of vote-by-mail, arguing, despite lack of evidence, that the practice is rife with fraud and led to his 2020 loss — most recently Monday night to reporters on Air Force One.”
“The strict voter identification measure that Republicans pushed through the House last week was just their opening salvo in a monthslong effort to establish new voting restrictions they regard as crucial to keeping control of Congress ahead of midterm elections the GOP is in danger of losing,” the New York Times reports.
“The relentless focus on the bills, which face an uphill path to becoming law, serves two purposes that Republicans view as existential. It is aimed at intensifying the pressure within their own ranks to do whatever necessary to muscle the legislation through Congress and to President Trump’s desk, allowing them to make changes they believe could reshape the electorate in their favor.”
“Barring that, it allows Republicans to amplify the president’s false claims of mass voter fraud, sowing distrust ahead of the November elections that helps build a case, however groundless, that any Democratic victories will be a result of cheating.”
Politico: “A flood of Republican-backed efforts to tighten voter ID laws is serving as a distraction from more serious threats to the American voting system.”
“Experts point to recent rollbacks to frontline programs that protect state and local elections, as well as cuts to the top federal agency that guards electoral systems, as key threats ahead of the midterms. But lawmakers are focused elsewhere: They’re currently debating policy measures to crack down on noncitizen voting and move election certification authorities to the federal government.”
President Trump said on Truth Social he doesn’t need Congress to get voter ID in place by the midterm elections.
Said Trump: “The Democrats refuse to vote for Voter I.D., or Citizenship. The reason is very simple — They want to continue to cheat in Elections. This was not what our Founders desired. I have searched the depths of Legal Arguments not yet articulated or vetted on this subject, and will be presenting an irrefutable one in the very near future. There will be Voter I.D. for the Midterm Elections, whether approved by Congress or not!“
“One of the more extraordinary aspects of President Trump’s second term is this: Some of the most far-out election conspiracists who helped him spread lies about the 2020 election and then tried to overturn it are now inside the government,” the New York Times reports.
“This dynamic came into focus on Tuesday when an unsealed FBI search warrant affidavit revealed that the recent criminal investigation into the 2020 election results in Fulton County had been instigated by Kurt Olsen, a rather prominent character in Mr. Trump’s election denialism movement. Mr. Olsen, who is a lawyer, was considered by people in the first Trump administration to be a fringe menace.”
“In the second Trump administration, he is the director of ‘election security and integrity,’ with the power to refer criminal investigations — criminal investigations into things that have been thoroughly debunked.”
“Sen. Lisa Murkowski became the first Republican senator to speak out against the SAVE Act, a sweeping election bill backed by President Donald Trump that would require proof of citizenship to vote nationwide,” NBC News reports.
“In doing so, the Alaskan reminded her colleagues on Tuesday that they roundly claimed to oppose new federal election laws as recently as Joe Biden’s presidency.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
