Trump's Unconstitutional Executive Order Tries to Usurp State Control Over Election Law

Mar 26, 2025

Donald Trump issued an executive order demanding new election rules that would make it harder for many citizens to register to vote. Constitutionally, he cannot set these rules by decree—but he can threaten to punish states that don’t adopt them.

The Associated Press reports:

President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed a sweeping executive action to overhaul elections in the U.S., including requiring documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote in federal elections and demanding that all ballots be received by Election Day. … It threatens to pull federal funding from states where election officials don’t comply. …
Voting rights groups have expressed concerns that the requirement could disenfranchise people. An estimated 9% of U.S. citizens of voting age, or 21.3 million people, do not have proof of citizenship readily available, according to a 2023 report by the Brennan Center for Justice and other groups.
There are also concerns that married women who have changed their names will encounter trouble when trying to register because their birth certificates list their maiden names. Such hiccups happened in recent town elections in New Hampshire, which has a new state law requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote.

This will face legal challenges because the Constitution gives state legislatures, not the president, the authority to determine the “times, places, and manner” of elections. But Trump is constantly trying to exceed his constitutional authority and daring the courts to restrain him.

The Executive Watch is a project of the Institute for the Study of Modern Authoritarianism, and its flagship publication The UnPopulist, to track in an ongoing way the abuses of the power of the American presidency. It sorts these abuses into five categories: Personal Grift, Political Corruption, Presidential Retribution, Power Consolidation, and Policy Illegality. Click the category of interest to get an overview of all the abuses under it.

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