About a month after Election Day 2024, Donald Trump received a “Patriot of the Year” award from Fox News and attended a network gala that was apparently designed to celebrate the Republican and his victory. As part of his remarks, Trump vowed to pursue changes on elections policy, adding, “We’re going to do things that have been really needed for a long time.”
Trump didn’t go into a lot of detail at the time, though he did specifically talk about “proof of citizenship” as one of his priorities.
Keep that in mind when reading about the president’s latest executive order. NBC News reported:
President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed a sweeping executive order attempting a major overhaul of American elections, requiring people to prove their citizenship when they register to vote. The order — which also includes an array of other changes, from mail-in ballot deadlines to election equipment — could risk disenfranchising tens of millions of Americans. Election law experts questioned whether Trump had the authority to make the changes, saying the order is all but certain to be met with legal challenges.
Last year, congressional Republicans tried to advance legislation called the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act (or SAVE Act), that would require proof of citizenship to register to vote. The bill did not, however, pass the Senate or become law.
Months later, Trump apparently decided that he can just create the policy anyway through presidential fiat. It’s an approach rooted in a fundamentally ridiculous governing vision: When Congress fails to pass a bill, presidents can simply implement laws anyway, without legislative approval.
But that’s not all the latest executive order does. From the NBC News report: The executive order makes a number of other sweeping changes, including prohibiting certain election equipment that uses QR codes. Those changes would force states to buy and install new election equipment at significant cost. The order also requires that all ballots must be received by Election Day, an attempt to override states that allow mail ballots that are postmarked by Election Day to be received afterward. It also asks the Department of Government Efficiency and federal agencies to hunt through state voter rolls in pursuit of ineligible voters.
A Washington Post report summarized the problem succinctly: “The U.S. Constitution designates the power to regulate the ‘time, place and manner’ of elections to the states, with the proviso that Congress can step in and override those laws. It gives no specific power to the president to do so. Election experts said that Trump was claiming power he does not have and that lawsuits over the measure were all but guaranteed.” There’s a term for efforts by presidents to assert authority that they do not have: They’re called power-grabs. Trump has already lost a great many court fights since starting his second term; this executive order will almost certainly keep the streak going.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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