President Trump’s tampering with the nation’s election system took another misguided turn last week when he crippled the independent federal agency dedicated to helping states secure fair voting procedures.
By removing the remaining three members of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, the president flexed his newly-acquired executive power, granted by the Supreme Court’s recent decision letting him remove leaders of independent agencies without cause.
More significantly, it abets his crusade to enact federal voting laws making it more difficult for citizens to register to vote in the pivotal midterm House and Senate elections.
Two of the sacked commissions are Democrats; the third a Republican, who opted to resign. The agency’s fourth commissioner, a Republican, departed in April. The president can now nominate replacements to his liking – two from each party, subject to Senate consent – or do nothing indefinitely.
A rare bipartisan agency by law, it administers the national mail voter registration form, a responsibility that irked Trump when commissioners declined to modify the form to reflect his 2025 executive order that restricted mail voting and required proof of citizenship.
A federal judge in Boston last month permanently barred Trump’s order, declaring the president has no specific powers over elections. The Constitution assigns those powers to the states and Congress, not overreaching presidents.
But that’s not the commission’s only function. It also helps states meet voting requirements, oversees testing and certification of voting machines, funds election security and shares states’ best election practices.
Congress created the commission 24 years ago after election system failures in the memorable 2000 election, when Republican George W. Bush defeated Democrat Al Gore in one of our closest presidential elections.
That outcome took more than a month to decide due to Florida’s weeks-long final call. The Supreme Court ended the legal wrangling over conflicting results and “hanging chad” punch-card ballots. The verdict upheld the Florida Secretary of State’s decision that Bush had won Florida by 571 votes, giving him a slim majority of Electoral College votes and the presidency.
Gore strongly disagreed with the court’s reasoning, yet he accepted it “for the sake of our unity as a people and the strength of our democracy.”
A stark contrast to Trump’s obsessive insistence his 2020 election defeat to Democrat Joe Biden resulted from a rigged election – caused, without evidence, by fraudulent mail and noncitizen voting. He lost several legal attempts to overturn the 2020 results. But conspiracy charges tied to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot over the issue got dropped when Trump won a second term in 2024.
He is still pursuing his headstrong quest six years later. A weaponized Justice Department investigation into the 2020 election includes FBI seizure of stored ballots from Georgia, California, Arizona and Michigan — states Trump lost. He refuses to move on. Too many of his forever followers believe his baseless fraud claims.
Worse, he’s trying to influence November’s midterm election outcome by reshaping America’s voting system. Hence, Trump’s misleading legislation (SAVE America Act) that makes it much harder for citizens to vote. Here’s why: Citizens who cannot produce their birth certificate or an active passport or naturalization papers won’t be able to register to vote. Those who changed their name in marriage or through court filings will need to register again and show proof why their new name doesn’t match their birth certificate.
The nonpartisan Brennan Justice Center says that amounts to about 21 million Americans since only half the U.S. population possess active passports and many others can’t readily come up with their birth certification or naturalization papers due to misplacement, loss or non-existing courthouse records.
Mail voting, popular in nearly all states, is a paradoxical Trump target. Checking voter validity is easier, safer and more accurate than vetting citizens who vote in person on Election Day. If questions arise, they can be checked quickly and electronically.
Mail voting also encourages more citizens to vote, serving democracy’s intent. That’s also the reason to allow a reasonable grace period for late-arriving ballots postmarked by Election Day and counted afterwards.
There is one non-threatening element of the Trump bill: requiring state, tribal or federal photo ID to ensure voter identities match those on registration rolls. Photo ID is a common digital era security check for driving, flying, drinking and other activities. It is not a barrier to voting.
Major arguments over voting rights go back to the nation’s founding. Originally, only white adult male property owners could cast ballots. Eventually, in the interest of equality, reform movements extended the rights to women, Black people and persons 18, 19 and 20 years old.
To now impede the right to vote on the false premise our current system encourages rigging mocks the blessings of liberty and justice offered all Americans.