They Do Not Want You to Vote: †rump's New Executive Order on Mail-In Voting

On the evening of March 31, 2026 — the same day eight million Americans were still celebrating the largest protest in U.S. history — Donold †rump signed an executive order targeting the way Americans vote. Not the way undocumented people vote. The way you vote. The way your neighbor votes. The way your grandmother votes from her assisted living facility.

This is his second executive order on elections. His first was largely blocked by federal courts. He signed

another one anyway. That tells you everything you need to know about what this Regime thinks of the rule of law and about how desperate it is to control who gets to participate in American democracy.

What the Order Actually Does

The executive order, titled "Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections," does three main things:

• Creates a federal voter list. The order directs the Department of Homeland Security, working with the

Social Security Administration, to compile a list of verified U.S. citizens eligible to vote in each state. Only people on that list would be allowed to receive a mail-in ballot.

• Gives the U.S. Postal Service control over ballot distribution. The Postal Service would be directed to

send ballots only to voters who appear on the federally approved list, giving an executive branch agency unprecedented control over a function that has always belonged to states.

• Threatens prosecution. The order directs the Attorney General to prioritize investigation and prosecution of election officials, individuals, and entities that distribute ballots to people not on the approved list.

In other words: state election workers could face federal prosecution for following their own state's laws. It also requires ballots to include secure envelopes with unique barcodes for tracking. And it allows states

that fail to comply to lose federal funding.

What the Constitution Actually Says

This is not complicated. The Constitution's Elections Clause gives states and Congress the power to make laws governing elections. It does not mention any presidential authority over election administration. Not a word. The president has no constitutional role in running elections.

David Becker, a former Justice Department lawyer and leading election law expert, was direct: "This is

unconstitutional on its face. The Constitution clearly gives the president no power over elections. I expect

that this will be blocked by multiple federal courts in a very short period of time and have no legal effect

whatsoever." Rick Hasen, professor of election law at UCLA, said the order is "pretty mild, given what could have been, but it's still unconstitutional and not something that could really be implemented in time." When asked whether the Postal Service and DHS could realistically implement the changes before November, Hasen was blunt: "No way."

Danielle Lang, vice president for voting rights at the Campaign Legal Center: "The president has no power to direct the creation of any of these lists or to restrict the delivery of mail ballots to any given list."

But perhaps the most revealing moment came from †rump himself. Caught on C-SPAN and shared by

journalist Brian Tyler Cohen, here is what †rump said as he signed the order:

"I don't know how it can be challenged. You may find a rogue judge. You got a lot of rogue judges, very bad bad people, very bad judges. But that's the only way that can be changed... I don't see how anybody can challenge it."

Read that again. The president of the United States, while signing an executive order, is pre-emptively

attacking the federal judges who will review it as "bad bad people" — before they have even ruled. That is

not the language of someone confident in the law. That is the language of someone who knows his order is legally indefensible and is already planning to delegitimize the courts that will strike it down.

The SAVE Tool

Here is the part of this story that should make every American's blood run cold. The federal database this

executive order directs DHS to use, the SAVE system, is already known to wrongly flag American

citizens as noncitizens. And the Regime plans to build the entire national voter list on top of it.

FactCheck.org reported on March 31 that the SAVE database has been used in nearly two dozen states and has wrongly flagged many U.S. citizens as noncitizens. The data-matching program identified about 10,000 potential noncitizens out of 49 million voter registrations checked, but upon further investigation, county officials found U.S. citizens among those identified.

Utah ran every registered voter in the state through a citizenship review. The result: one confirmed

noncitizen — who did not vote. Utah's Republican Lt. Governor Deidre Henderson, who oversees elections in the state, said plainly: "The bottom line is, there is not a widespread problem." She also noted that through the review, "We also learned that the federal government does not keep accurate databases." The SAVE program, she said, "is notoriously inaccurate and frequently flags individuals who" are in fact citizens.

A joint investigation by ProPublica and the Texas Tribune found the system is making persistent mistakes, particularly when assessing citizenship for people born outside the United States. In Missouri, state officials acted on SAVE's findings before verifying them, directing county election clerks to temporarily ban flagged voters from casting ballots. In hundreds of cases, those voters turned out to be American citizens.

In Texas, the SAVE tool identified 2,724 potential noncitizens out of more than 18 million registered voters. When counties investigated, many of those flagged turned out to be citizens. In Denton County alone, at least 14% of flagged voters were citizens, with the real error rate likely higher.

This is the tool †rump just signed an executive order to use as the foundation for a national voter list that

determines who gets a ballot. A tool that a Republican lieutenant governor called "notoriously inaccurate." A tool that has already stripped American citizens of their ability to vote in Missouri. A tool that DHS rushed into use, according to ProPublica, while it was still adding data.

If you are a naturalized citizen — born outside the United States but a full American citizen — this database could mark you as ineligible. You could be left off the list. You might not even know until you try to request a ballot and discover you're not on it.

The Real Goal: Controlling Who Votes

†rump has been pushing this agenda since he lost in 2020 — an election that was free, fair, and certified by officials of both parties in every state. His claims of widespread mail-in voter fraud have been debunked repeatedly and comprehensively.

A 2025 report by the Brookings Institution found that mail voting fraud occurred in only 0.000043% of total mail ballots cast, about four cases per 10 million ballots. That is not a crisis. That is a pretext. The actual effect of this order, if implemented, would be to strip millions of Americans of their ability to vote by mail.

Nearly a third of all voters cast mail ballots in the 2024 general election. Elderly voters. Disabled voters. Voters in rural areas far from polling places. Voters who work two jobs and can't take time off on Election Day. Overseas military personnel. These are the people this order targets.

And there is a more alarming dimension. CBS News reported that the Justice Department and DHS are

close to finalizing an agreement to use sensitive voter registration data for immigration and criminal

investigations. The Regime is building a database of who is registered to vote — and planning to run it

through immigration enforcement systems. Your voter registration could be used to flag you for ICE.

Marc Elias, founder of Democracy Docket, called it plainly: "This is a massive and unconstitutional voter

suppression effort aimed at giving †rump the power to create a list of who is allowed to vote by mail. We

know where this will go — the targeting of Democrats for mass disenfranchisement."

The Hypocrisy Is Not Subtle

†rump voted by mail in Florida's special election earlier this month, even though he was in town and early in-person voting was available. He defended it by saying he's the president. Mail voting is fine for him. It is "legendary" cheating when you do it.

This is the same man who has told Republicans they will lose the midterms if they don't crack down on mail voting. He is not concerned about fraud. He is concerned about losing. Those are different things.

States Are Already Fighting Back

Within minutes of the signing, state officials across the country pledged to sue. This is the same playbook that blocked his first election executive order, and it will work again because the Constitution is clear.

Oregon Secretary of State Tobias Read: "We don't need decrees from Washington, D.C. My message to the President: We'll see you in court." Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes called the order "nothing more than a push to weaponize the sensitive personal information of voters in this country" and vowed to meet the federal government in court.

He noted that Arizona's vote-by-mail system was designed by Republicans and has delivered secure

elections for decades. Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell said her office is reviewing the order and will take appropriate legal action. "The †rump Administration cannot interfere with the right to vote and may not override state election authority," she said.

The NAACP called the order "unconstitutional" and "unserious." "His attempts to silence us will only make us louder — with our voices and our votes," said NAACP president Derrick Johnson.

A Pattern, Not an Incident

This is †rump's second executive order on elections. His first was largely blocked by courts. He signed

another one anyway. This Regime has also threatened IÇE at polling places, sued more than two dozen

states for their voter rolls, and attempted to assert federal control over elections that the Constitution

explicitly leaves to states.

The V-Dem Institute, which tracks democratic health in every country on earth, found that the U.S. has fallen to the level of democratic functioning it had in 1965 before the Voting Rights Act was fully enforced. That is not a coincidence. It is a project.

Every piece of this fits together: IÇE at polling places to create fear, voter roll purges to remove eligible

voters, and now a federal list that determines who gets a ballot. The goal is not election integrity. The goal is a smaller electorate, one carefully shaped to keep this Regime in power.

The ACLU filed a formal condemnation within hours of the signing. Their statement called the order

"unlawful" and said it "would create chaos in election administration and lead to the disenfranchisement of many eligible voters who depend on mail voting." The ACLU also noted that a federal court has already affirmed, in blocking †rump's first election executive order, that the president has no authority to change election laws. This second order walks directly into the same legal wall.

David Becker's full assessment, provided in a statement to MS NOW, went further than his "banning gravity" quip: "There's not a single provision in here that will withstand judicial review. This is a wholly

unconstitutional executive order. It will be blocked before the ink is dry. The president has no power under

the Constitution to dictate to states how they run elections."

And here is a detail that deserves far more attention than it has received. A DOJ official admitted in court last week that the Justice Department plans to share sensitive voter registration data with the Department of Homeland Security, to run it through the SAVE system to search for noncitizens. The same SAVE system that a Republican lieutenant governor called "notoriously inaccurate." The same system that has already stripped American citizens of their right to vote in Missouri. Your voter registration data — your name, address, party affiliation — is being collected, shared with immigration enforcement, and run through a broken database. That is not election administration. That is surveillance.

Gerrymandering the Map Before You Vote

Restricting mail-in voting is only one piece of the strategy. While the Regime works to control who gets a

ballot, Republican-controlled states are simultaneously redrawing congressional maps mid-decade to

control what those ballots can accomplish.

Missouri is the clearest example. At †rump's request, Missouri Republicans redrew their congressional map last year in a special session, a move that would likely flip one of the two congressional seats held by Democrats to a Republican. Missouri voters fought back, gathering more than 305,000 signatures — nearly three times the number required — to trigger a referendum and let the people vote on the new map.

Republicans responded by running out the clock. The Secretary of State dragged his feet on signature

verification. GOP officials changed judicial venues six times across four cases to find favorable judges. The state attorney general opened an immigration investigation into signature gatherers. Paid agitators were deployed to harass volunteers. And on March 27, a court ruled the new gerrymandered map could be used in the 2026 midterms — before voters ever got to weigh in — because Missouri's candidate filing deadline closed on March 31.

Richard von Glahn, executive director of People Not Politicians, put it plainly: "What they are hoping to do is to lose slowly enough so that they may conduct an illegal election and provide President †rump a

congressional seat against the requirements of the Missouri Constitution and, I think, the wish of Missouri voters."

Missouri is not alone. It is one of three GOP-controlled states that redrew congressional maps at †rump's

request specifically to help Republicans win the 2026 midterms.

A Coordinated State-Level Campaign

The executive order does not exist in isolation. The Voting Rights Lab is currently tracking 1,565 bills pre-filed or introduced this legislative session across 44 states and Washington D.C. Of those, 323 would restrict voter access or election administration. State legislatures have become the front line of this assault on democracy.

Voting Rights Lab CEO Samantha Tarazi said it directly: "State legislatures are now the top threat to the

freedom to vote this November. The president's ongoing lies on the 2020 election are designed to spark

state action and sow voter doubts ahead of this year's midterms, and the fight is far from over."

Utah and South Dakota have already enacted proof of citizenship requirements. Mississippi has passed a

bill that would require all mail ballots to be received before Election Day if the Supreme Court rules against mail ballot deadlines in a pending case. North Carolina's restrictive same-day registration process has been upheld by a federal court. Arizona is advancing a bill to remove voting eligibility for some overseas Americans.

And here is the number that should stop every American in their tracks. A new report from the Bipartisan

Policy Center found that roughly 28.4 million voting-age citizens lack ready access to the documents —

passports, birth certificates — needed to register to vote under proof-of-citizenship requirements. These are not noncitizens. These are American citizens who would be effectively disenfranchised by the policies

†rump and his allies are pushing.

The report also found that Republicans are more likely to depend on birth certificates than Democrats, and birth certificates may be considered less reliable proof than passports under these new rules. In other words: these voter suppression policies could disenfranchise Republican voters too. This is not about protecting elections. It is about reducing the electorate.

This is what a coordinated attack on democracy looks like. Not a single dramatic moment, but a sustained, multi-front campaign: restrict mail voting, build a flawed federal voter list, deploy IÇE near polling places, gerrymander the maps, and pass state laws that mirror every federal restriction Congress won't pass. Every piece is part of the same project.

Why Now: Because He's Losing

Let's be clear about what is actually driving this executive order. It is not a sudden discovery of voter fraud. It is not a constitutional principle. It is a president whose approval rating has hit a second-term low of 39.9 percent — what CNN data analyst Harry Enten called 'Death Valley' — with polling showing Democrats hold as much as an 11-point advantage on the generic ballot heading into the November midterms.

This is the same man who, after losing the 2020 election, filed 40 baseless lawsuits uniformly rejected by

courts across the country, then incited a deadly riot at the U.S. Capitol in a last-ditch attempt to prevent Congress from certifying his loss. He has spent six years falsely claiming mail-in ballots enabled Democrats to cheat, even as he and his family continue to vote by mail themselves.

†rump himself told House Republicans in January: "You've got to win the midterms, because if we don't win the midterms, it's just going to be, I mean, they'll find a reason to impeach me." He knows what is at stake.

This executive order is not election integrity. It is election insurance.

Rep. Joe Morelle, the ranking Democrat on the House Administration Committee, which has jurisdiction

over election law, said the order shows †rump "fears the American people and is willing to violate the

Constitution to stop them from voting. His Executive Order is illegal, dangerous and subversive. It will not

stand."

David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, was equally direct:

"The only thing it will accomplish is to make liberal lawyers wealthier. He might as well sign an EO banning gravity." He predicted it would be blocked immediately.

And Maryland Governor Wes Moore, connecting every piece of this together, told CNN: "I think these are all tools of how the president is trying to think about a much larger plan, which is if you cannot hold on to power through democratic elections, then adjust democratic elections."

That is the thesis. Stated plainly by a governor, backed by the evidence in every section of this blog. A

president whose party is losing is using the machinery of the federal government to change who gets to

vote, who gets a ballot, who gets counted, and which party wins the districts. If that is not an assault on

democracy, nothing is.

What You Must Do Right Now

Check your mail-in ballot status. Contact your county election office, and confirm you are on the permanent mail voter list in your state. Do not assume. Verify.

Know your rights. The courts are expected to block this order. But fear is the point: fear that your ballot won't count, fear that showing up will get you in trouble. Do not let this Regime's intimidation tactics keep you home. Your vote is protected by the Constitution and by the Voting Rights Act.

Contact your representatives. Call your House member and senators today at the Congressional switchboard: (202) 224-3121. Tell them to oppose any legislation that restricts mail-in voting, to support the legal challenges, and to defend state authority over elections.

Volunteer as a poll worker or voter escort. The most powerful thing you can do is show up — for yourself and for your neighbors. Sign up at powerthepolls.org. Contact your county election office. Call the Election Protection hotline if you see problems: 1-866-OUR-VOTE (1-866-687-8683).

Support the legal challenges. Democracy Docket (democracydocket.com) and the Campaign Legal Center are already on this. They need resources to fight. Your donation funds the lawyers who will block this order in court, just as they blocked the last one.

Stay connected with us. Find us at Citizens Against Tyranny and follow us on Substack, Communities, UpScrolled, and find more on our LinkTree. We are watching. We are organizing. We are not stopping.

In 2024, nearly one in three Americans voted by mail. This Regime wants to decide which one of those three gets a ballot. The courts will fight this. States will fight this. And so will we.

They don't want you to vote. That alone should be reason enough to make sure you do.

References

1. White House — Executive Order: Ensuring Citizenship Verification and Integrity in Federal Elections (March 31, 2026)

2. C-SPAN via Brian Tyler Cohen — †rump's own words as he signed the executive order (YouTube)

3. CNBC — †rump signs executive order limiting mail-in voting ahead of 2026 elections

4. Washington Post — †rump issues executive order seeking to limit mail-in voting

5. NPR — †rump signs new executive order on voting; experts say he lacks the authority

6. CBS News — †rump signs order on mail-in ballots and federally run voter lists

7. Votebeat — †rump issues executive order giving U.S. Postal Service oversight over mail voting

8. Democracy Docket — †rump signs sweeping order attacking mail-in voting

9. OPB / AP — †rump signs order directing creation of a national voter list

10. Newsweek — What †rump's National Voter List Executive Order means for how Americans cast ballots

11. Texas Tribune / Votebeat — †rump issues order to impose new rules on mail-in ballots

12. CNN — †rump signs executive order to crack down on mail-in voting

13. Bloomberg — †rump Executive Order moves to crack down on mail-in voting

14. Press Democrat / AP — †rump signs order directing creation of a national voter list

15. ACLU — Condemns President †rump's Executive Order attempting to restrict mail-in voting

16. MS NOW — †rump signs executive order targeting mail-in ballots. But it might have no teeth.

17. FactCheck.org — Flaws in Government Tool to ID Noncitizen Voters (March 31, 2026)

18. ProPublica / Texas Tribune — SAVE Tool Keeps Mistakenly Flagging Voters as Noncitizens

19. Texas Tribune — SAVE tool keeps mistakenly flagging voters as noncitizens

20. PolitiFact — Is the federal SAVE tool booting naturalized citizens from voter rolls?

21. Democracy Docket — GOP derails bid to stop Missouri gerrymander for 2026

23. Voting Rights Lab — 2026 Election Law Tracker: 1,565 bills across 44 states

24. Bipartisan Policy Center — Report: 28.4 million voting-age citizens lack ready access to required documents

25. The Independent — †rump attempts mail-in voting crackdown as party's standing slides ahead of midterms

26. CNN — Democrats are trying to connect the dots on †rump's 2026 plan

27. Democracy Docket — GOP derails bid to stop Missouri gerrymander for 2026

28. Democracy Docket — Legal challenges to election executive orders

29. Power the Polls — Sign up to be a poll worker