Executive overreach: Fixing what's not broken

President Trump's most recent Executive Order on election integrity will create significant challenges for our election officials, voters, and impact trust in our election system. While the order purports to strengthen election security, its real impact will likely be a complex web of legal battles, additional administrative burdens, and a destabilization of the decentralized election system that has long been the hallmark of our democracy.

In a piece written by the conservative think tank CATO Institute in 2020, Walter Olson discusses the benefits of a decentralized election system, touting that a decentralized system “prevents a power from being centralized that would be dangerously tempting to demagogues and authoritarians.” In a flurry of moves over the last few weeks, the Trump administration is slowly stripping away at the foundations of the decentralized election system that aids in ensuring the safety and security of our free and fair elections — aiming to move control of elections to the executive branch. This includes attempting to control our federal campaign finance laws through the Federal Election Commission (FEC), attempting to control the directives of the independent Election Assistance Commission (EAC), and giving Elon Musk and the unchecked Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) unfettered access to American’s voter data. This is executive overreach disguised as election reform.

---

---

Free and fair elections are the bedrock of American democracy. That means that Americans are able to cast a ballot safely and securely, without undue influence from bad actors both foreign and domestic. The 2024 general election saw near-historic levels of voter turnout that favored Republicans, leading the current administration to a decisive victory. Yet, the Trump administration is now trying to continue leveraging seeds of mistrust sown after the 2020 election into a referendum on practices that did not need to be changed.

Attempts to Control Accountability

That referendum began with attacks on the FEC, an independent agency created by Congress to administer and enforce federal campaign finance laws. The Trump administration recently moved the FEC under its control, among other executive agencies, potentially giving the president undue influence over our nation’s elections. In addition President Trump unilaterally fired an FEC commissioner, an unprecedented and illegal move that damages the credibility and work of an agency designed to reduce corruption and increase transparency within our campaign finance system. If the goal of the administration was to reform the FEC, the mandate should have been pushed to Congress, where the authority to amend the FEC’s statutory law lies.

Next, the Trump Administration moved to weaken one of the most critical agencies for election officials across the country: The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). Despite a history of broad bipartisan support since its inception, CISA has been dramatically downsized over the last two months. Funding for key cybersecurity initiatives, including the Elections Infrastructure Information Sharing and Analysis Center (EI-ISAC) and the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center (MS-ISAC), has been halted, effectively shuttering these services. This dismantling of CISA’s elections work leaves our elections vulnerable and impairs a critical partnership between the federal government and state and local election officials that keeps our elections secure and safe, as election officials have expressed many times.

Unprecedented Overreach

The latest blow comes through the Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections executive order, signed by President Trump on March 25, 2025. The order is an unprecedented power grab by the President that overrides existing federal law passed by Congress and ignores the election administration authorities that reside with the states. The executive order creates unnecessary barriers to voting, undermines vote-by-mail, makes it harder for eligible Americans to register to vote, and demands that states give DOGE unfettered access to voter registration data. These are burdens disguised as solutions for problems that don’t exist; the nation’s election mail was delivered expediently in accordance with state and federal laws, noncitizen voting is exceedingly rare, and the 2024 election was safe and secure.

Even more concerning is the attempt to bring the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) under the control of the executive branch — much like what has already been done to other agencies, including the FEC. If the order is allowed to be implemented, the EAC could be weaponized and used to coerce states to comply with the executive order’s mandates. States that are noncompliant could see federal funds for election administration stripped away.This particular enforcement mechanism was not in play when 44 states rejected President Trump’s first attempt to access sensitive voter information through the wildly unpopular “Presidential Commission on Election Integrity” back in 2017.

Americans need to understand how this executive order fits into a broader effort to weaken our system of checks and balances. Regardless of the validity or feasibility of its provisions, our nation has long prided itself on governing by the rule of law. President Trump’s latest executive order threatens our decentralized system and once again overrides Congress’ role as the legislative branch — the body responsible for representing the diverse interests of the American people. Furthermore, bypassing regular order undermines trust in our electoral systems and institutions. Executive orders, unlike legislation, can be reserved by the next president, adding instability to our critical infrastructure.

Who bears the burden of these rapid changes to critical election law and infrastructure? The brave patriots that are our election officials. The consequence of many of these decrees is that they are unfunded mandates, will require immediate implementation, leaving no time to prepare, train staff, or educate voters. Not to mention that many of the staff in local election offices are overworked, underpaid, and lack adequate funding to streamline implementation. There is no doubt that election officials will continue to persevere despite these changes and lack of funding, as they have done many times in the past. However, voters should be wary, apprehensive, and angered by the moves of the Trump administration.

Elections are a cornerstone of our democracy in action — if those same elections are further ushered into the hands of a president who has shown a willingness to subvert the will of the people if the outcome is not favorable to them, the consequences for the future of America and self-government are in peril. Now more than ever, we must protect our free and fair elections, the hardworking officials in our communities who ensure that every ballot is counted fairly and accurately, and the voters who have the real power in this country to elect our leaders and write the next chapter in American history.

---