In September, the US Department of Justice sued several states for refusing to share voter registration lists with the federal government. The DoJ claims the states have violated federal law. The data – which includes driver licence and social security numbers – has historically been closely guarded by state election officials.

White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said the administration’s goal is to ensure ‘clean voter rolls’. Countersuits allege the Trump administration is unlawfully using the data to suppress voters.

There has been considerable friction following the DoJ’s demands. A South Carolina judge received death threats after she was criticised by a Trump official for temporarily blocking the administration’s data request. State Judge Diane Goodstein’s house burned down, and the causes are being investigated.

Control of Congress and the future of Trump’s second presidency are at stake in the 2026 midterm elections, with all 435 members of the House of Representatives and 35 of 100 Senate seats contested. Loss of Republican majorities would hand power to Democrats, depriving President Trump of legislative support and exposing his administration to oversight.

President Trump’s executive order, titled ‘Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections,’ requires voters to provide documentary proof of US citizenship to register, sets a strict deadline for receipt of mail-in ballots and demands recertification of electronic voting systems to meet updated standards.

Several states and a number of civil rights groups have brought lawsuits calling the order unconstitutional and contrary to existing law. ‘Under the US Constitution, states regulate the times, places and manner of holding elections for Congress, but it is Congress that may by law make or alter such regulation,’ says Steven Richman, Chair of the IBA Bar Issues Commission, who speaks in a personal capacity. ‘If there is perceived to be serious concerns with how elections are managed, Congress is situated to hold appropriate hearings, seek compromises and pass legislation,’ he adds. ‘It’s up to Congress, not the president, to enact appropriate laws.’

President Trump justified the executive order by claiming it was necessary to ‘restore trust in American elections’ and to safeguard against fraud and interference. The president continues to claim, without evidence, that the 2020 presidential election (won by Joe Biden) was stolen. He has repeatedly accused Democrats of ‘cheating’ and has fomented inaccurate claims that non-citizen migrants are voting illegally in large numbers.

In a social media post, he focused on what he claims is the ‘mail-in ballot hoax, using voting machines that are a complete and total disaster’ which ‘must end, now!’

The reality is that the US has a decentralised election system administered by state and local officials. State law sets policy on mail-in ballots, photo ID requirements, vote-counting machines and recounts. Local boards and officials manage details of running elections. Neighbourhood volunteers oversee the actual voting in precincts.

Bruce Spiva, Senior Vice President at the non-partisan voting rights advocacy Campaign Legal Center, says that Trump’s executive order is a blatant and unlawful overreach. By mandating documentary proof of citizenship for voter registration, the order would disenfranchise millions, especially those lacking passports or matching identification documents, Spiva says. ‘Under our Constitution, the president really has no role in the way states run elections,’ he says.

Extensive research shows non-citizen voting is extremely rare, largely because the risks are severe. Yet, President Trump’s long-running campaign to stoke fears of voter fraud has generated lawmaker support for restrictive laws that would disproportionately affect minority voters, says Spiva, whose organisation is one of the groups suing to block President Trump’s order. ‘It would make it impossible for millions and millions of people to cast their ballot,’ he says. ‘The incidence of non-citizens trying to vote is statistically negligible. For obvious reasons, people who are non-citizens don’t try to vote and risk a felony conviction and being thrown out of the country.’

In July, President Trump prompted the state of Texas to redraw voting maps to add five more Republicans to the state’s congressional delegation. Texas Republicans dissolved several majority Black and Latino districts in an attempt to gerrymander the vote. Other Republican states including Florida, Missouri, Indiana and Ohio are moving to redraw their maps too.

Their plans seek to maximise the number of seats the party can win in any given election and mean ‘cracking open Democratic constituencies and trying to sort them into different districts to dilute their power,’ says Charles Hunt, professor of political science at Boise State University.

Now, in what Hunt says has become a nationwide race to the bottom, California, New York and other states with Democratic majorities are threatening to retaliate by eliminating Republican-held seats.

Many states have laws against gerrymandering because it undercuts the democratic principle of ‘one person, one vote’. In states such as Texas, where there are no state law prohibitions against gerrymandering, legal challengers are citing the federal Voting Rights Act, which provides grounds for invalidating state maps on the basis of race. That law is being challenged now before the US Supreme Court in a case involving majority-Black districts in Louisiana.

Various lawsuits have, meanwhile, been filed seeking to invalidate California's process under both state and federal law. California voters will have a chance on 4 November to approve or disapprove their governor’s redistricting proposal in a ballot initiative.

Overall, ‘these efforts make it clear President Trump is preparing to use the power of his office to interfere in the 2026 election,’ says Samantha Tarazi, CEO of the Voting Rights Lab, a nonpartisan NGO. ‘What started as an unconstitutional executive order, as marching orders for state action regardless of its fate in court, has now grown into a full federal mobilisation to seize power over our elections.’

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