Trump mail-in voting order sparks lawsuit from Democrats 

Democrats on Wednesday sued the Trump administration to block President Trump’s recent executive order cracking down on mail-in voting.  

The president announced earlier this week that he directed Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, along with the Social Security Administration, to create a list of verified U.S. citizens who are eligible to vote. The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) will only be permitted to send ballots to those people.

“Our Constitution’s Framers anticipated this kind of desire for absolute power,” wrote prominent Democratic election lawyer Marc Elias in the complaint. “They recognized the menace it would pose to ordered liberty and the ways in which it would corrode self-government like an acid.”

“And so, to preserve the People’s own sovereignty, they crafted a system of government to resist that threat,” he continued, contending that the Constitution empowers the states and Congress to determine who may vote by mail, not presidents.  

Democratic leaders in Congress — Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.) — filed the lawsuit along with the Democratic National Committee and other party organizations.  

It’s the latest legal fight over Trump’s efforts to reshape elections. After the president issued an executive order last year seeking to overhaul elections, federal judges ruled it was likely unconstitutional.  

The Democrats argued in their Wednesday lawsuit that Trump has tried “again and again” to rewrite the rules for elections for “his own perceived partisan advantage.” They called mail-in voting his “favorite scapegoat” after his 2020 election loss.  

“This Executive Order seeks to impose radical changes to the manner and conditions under which citizens may cast absentee or mail-in ballots — changes that imminently threaten to disenfranchise lawful voters and plainly exceed the President’s lawful authority,” Elias wrote. 

The Democrats noted that Trump’s order does not require USPS to give notice to voters whose ballots will not be delivered, suggesting it could leave them disenfranchised without their knowledge or a chance to make sure their ballot gets counted.

The president has for years pushed false claims of fraud in the 2020 presidential election, urging tighter rules on voting by mail as one way to crack down.  

Still, the president himself often votes by mail. He cast his ballot that way in a Florida special election last month.  

In a statement, Schumer called Trump’s executive order “outlandish.” 

“Senate Democrats have led the fight against Donald Trump’s voter suppression efforts before and won,” the top Democrat said. “We will see him in court and we will beat him again.” 

Jeffries said in a statement following Trump’s order that the president’s “unhinged efforts to rip away our rights will not prevail.”

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