Election officials warn Trump's order is bringing them a 'nightmare' before the midterms

As election officials across the country steel themselves for the midterm elections in less than five months, President Donald Trump’s executive order restricting voting by mail threatens to upend their preparations.The executive order instructs the U.S. Postal Service to refuse to deliver ballots in states that don’t provide lists of voters or meet other requirements. It has created a sense of deep uncertainty and concern among election officials as they consider how to comply, according to a review of court documents and interviews with election officials and experts on election administration.The March 31 executive order, and a proposed Postal Service rule published June 2 that would put the order’s requirements into effect, raise serious logistical and procedural challenges for those running elections, they say. Rural areas with limited resources are especially at risk, but jurisdictions of all sizes could be forced to scramble.The executive order is the latest step taken by Trump to assert control over state-run elections, along with the stalled SAVE America Act, which would require voters to provide documents proving their citizenship. The Justice Department, under Trump’s control, is also trying to obtain state voter rolls.“This is just another death by a thousand cuts that clerks have been experiencing since the 2020 elections,” said Barb Byrum, the Democratic clerk of Ingham County, Michigan, which includes Lansing.First-ever national voter listThe order and the rule require states to provide lists of mail-in voters if they want the Postal Service to deliver ballots, marking the first time the federal government has created a national voter list.Mail ballot envelopes must meet certain design standards. And federal agencies have to compile lists of voting-age citizens to share with each state in an effort to root out noncitizen voters.But Democratic states and voting rights groups argue the executive order — and the accompanying proposed rule — represent an illegal overreach by Trump because states administer elections under the U.S. Constitution. Trump and his Republican allies say the restrictions are necessary for election security and to combat noncitizen voting, which occurs extremely rarely.The Postal Service didn’t respond to questions from States Newsroom. The agency has said the rule “will facilitate the faithful execution of federal law.”Multiple lawsuits have been brought against the order, but a federal judge in Washington, D.C., in May declined to halt it, partly because the Trump administration hadn’t taken enough action to implement its requirements. Another federal judge in Massachusetts is weighing a separate request to block the order.With the executive order still in effect, at least for now, election officials and experts who work with them are taking the ramifications of it and the proposed Postal Service rule seriously.“We don’t have a national voter registration list. We don’t have, currently, a list of sanctioned, authorized voters to vote by mail at the federal level,” said Tammy Patrick, chief programs officer at Election Center, operated by the National Association of Election Officials. “That’s a big, big change in the way elections have always been conducted.”Sweeping changes very quicklyIn court papers filed in May, local election officials and local governments representing 26 jurisdictions across the country warned the executive order would “severely disrupt” local election administration and force the implementation of sweeping changes within months. Implementation of the order’s requirements will largely fall on local election officials, they argued.Byrum was among the officials to sign onto the brief, along with others in Boston, and counties in Pennsylvania, Washington, Wisconsin and elsewhere.Under the executive order, states that want to send ballots through the mail must provide the Postal Service with lists of voters they intend to provide a mail ballot. Local election officials will play a large role in helping states develop these lists, according to the court papers, and will have primary responsibility to help voters address any errors.And Trump wants it all in place before November. The executive order’s proposed timelines “present a logistical nightmare for local election officials,” the officials warn.“The general rule is don’t make changes before a big election because there’s always something you didn’t think about,” said Carolina Lopez, executive director of the Partnership for Large Election Jurisdictions, a nonpartisan organization for election officials in jurisdictions of at least 250,000 people.The proposed Postal Service rule says the agency would launch a portal where states would submit voter lists and make updates.