Trump administration drive to seize election powers sparking ‘chaos’ despite pushback

‘Trump’s unprecedented drive to change election rules is fueled by his obsession with his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden.’ Photograph: Anadolu/Getty ImagesView image in fullscreen‘Trump’s unprecedented drive to change election rules is fueled by his obsession with his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden.’ Photograph: Anadolu/Getty ImagesTrump administration drive to seize election powers sparking ‘chaos’ despite pushbackUS courts, state officials and Democrats warn that moves are endangering voting rights and the rule of lawThe Trump administration continues to expand its authoritarian and radical drive to revamp voting rules and seize state election powers, though it faces growing resistance from US courts, state officials and Democrats, who warn the moves are sparking “chaos” and endangering voting rights and the rule of law.

Donald Trump’s unprecedented drive to change election rules, which states legally set, is fueled by his obsession with his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden, which he falsely attributes to voting fraud, coupled with his fear that Democrats will “find a reason to impeach me” if they take control of the House in November’s midterms elections, say former election officials and legal experts.Given Trump’s dark mindset, his administration has used justice department legal moves and threats, FBI raids and investigations, and other federal agencies to coerce states to change voting rules in key ways, including curtailing voting by mail and machines that Trump and Maga allies have vilified, baselessly, as riddled with fraud.Legal experts say the administration is intimidating election workers and voters before the November elections, and laying the groundwork for potentially challenging election results where Republican candidates lose to ensure the GOP keeps control of Congress.

In a conspiratorial 25-minute televised talk on 16 July, Trump presented a hodgepodge of selective intelligence and misleading allegations about Chinese efforts to influence the 2020 elections to hurt him, plus debunked claims of increased voting by noncitizens, flawed voting machines and other threats, to argue that the US elections system needs drastic changes.Trump asserted without hard evidence that American elections were rife with “hacking, manipulation and corruption. Great damage has been done to our country.”

In a sharp rebuttal, the nation’s 24 Democratic governors said: “It’s deeply alarming that President Trump continues to try to undermine free and fair elections. No amount of lies and conspiracy theories can change the fact that our country’s elections have repeatedly been proven to be safe and secure.”Trump’s goal, say critics, is to instill fear in voters’ minds, and push for radical measures pre-election including congressional passage of the Save America Act, which would sharply limit voting by mail and require voters to present proof of US citizenship.

It lacks the votes in the Senate to pass.Over the past few months, for example, the Department of Justice has demanded that 30 US states provide unredacted voter lists, which contain personal and sensitive information. In July, top justice department official Harmeet Dhillon threatened state election officials with criminal investigations and prosecutions if they knowingly permitted noncitizens to register to vote.

The FBI has taken extraordinary steps to again investigate the Georgia election results in 2020 that Trump bitterly contested after his loss there: early in 2026, the FBI seized hundreds of boxes of 2020 ballots from Fulton county, and in July sent 200 agents there to investigate the 2020 results and election workers.The administration’s hardball tactics have sparked strong criticism from experts, and resistance including legal rebuffs from courts nationwide as well as state officials and Democrats.Voting rights advocates and former election officials point out that courts have overwhelmingly rebuked justice department lawyers for their claims seeking to justify administration moves to obtain unredacted voting lists from the states and information about election workers in Georgia and other states.

Eileen O’Connor, who spent eight years as an attorney in the justice department’s voting section in the civil rights division and is now with the Brennan Center for Justice, said: “[The] DoJ has had case after case seeking unredacted voter rolls from the states rejected by judges. The DoJ has filed 30 of these cases and has now lost 15 of them.”In another election-related matter where the Department of Justice sought detailed information on every election worker in Fulton county, Georgia, in the 2020 election, O’Connor noted the judge “openly excoriated the DoJ” and called the subpoena an “arbitrary fishing expedition”.

Although the justice department is not winning in courts, O’Connor stressed, “they’re injecting chaos” into this year’s elections. More broadly, O’Connor said, the administration’s strategy was “to decrease confidence in the elections and