Cato Experts: Trump Usurps Executive Limits to Alter Election Laws

“In this country, states are in charge of running federal elections, and Donald Trump isn’t. He keeps trying to usurp this constitutionally acknowledged role in defiance of both the law and the Constitution. His new proclamation tries to order states into a national system premised on the matching of citizenship records and voter rolls, which could very likely not be accomplished in time for this fall’s election, especially not in a way that is accurate. He also purports to order the U.S. Postal Service not to deliver lawful and valid ballots cast by citizens of states that ignore his dictates, which is plainly improper both because federal laws already direct what mail the U.S.P.S. may reject and what it must carry, and because the Postal Service answers to a Board of Governors, not him. Neither the U.S. Postal Service nor its overseers may be set up as deciders of whose votes to count.

“Courts will almost certainly block much of this, but it sows harmful uncertainty about how state and local administrators must prepare for the election and whether he will try to meddle further by steps such as impounding lawfully cast mail ballots.

“Trump is trying to grab arbitrary power over future elections of a sort that no one should be trusted with, let alone him.”

“This executive order represents the Trump administration’s continued disdain for the “normal” way in which large changes are made to public policy — either by states or by Congress. President Trump is clearly frustrated with Congress’s inability to pass new election laws. He doesn’t interpret this as a mandate to go back to the legislative drawing board, but rather a license to legislate without Congress and without the states.”