President Trump said Monday he will lead a “movement” to scrap mail-in ballots and certain voting machines from U.S. elections, saying paper ballots with watermarks are more reliable.
Mr. Trump, in a lengthy Truth Social post, said the effort would begin with an executive order to bring “honesty” to the 2026 midterm elections.
“Remember, the States are merely an ’agent’ for the Federal Government in counting and tabulating the votes,” he said. “They must do what the Federal Government, as represented by the President of the United States, tells them, FOR THE GOOD OF OUR COUNTRY, to do.”
Mr. Trump didn’t elaborate on what his order will say.
Mr. Trump criticized mail-in ballots days after a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. After the summit, Mr. Trump told Fox News that the Russian leader referenced potential fraud in the 2020 election.
“He said, ’Your election was rigged because you have mail-in voting,’” Mr. Trump said.
Any attempt by Mr. Trump to have a bigger say over vote-counting will be met with pushback from Democrats, who fear the president will try to fix the midterms in his favor to retain GOP majorities in Congress.
In the past, Republicans resisted Democratic attempts to give the federal government more sway over how elections are administered.
Mr. Trump’s antipathy for mail-in ballots stems from his 2020 election loss during the COVID-19 pandemic. Many states loosened their election rules so that voters could submit mail-in ballots instead of standing in long lines on Election Day.
Mr. Trump railed against the procedures as vulnerable to fraud, even before the election, and he blamed his defeat in part on unproven chicanery involving voting machines.
Mr. Trump’s attorney general at the time, William Barr, said those suspicions of fraud could not be proven.
Some members of the GOP chafed at Mr. Trump’s screed against mail ballots, saying it depressed turnout among their own voters.
Yet Mr. Trump said Monday that he wants people to put their election choices directly on paper and in person.
“I am going to lead a movement to get rid of MAIL-IN BALLOTS, and also, while we’re at it, Highly ’Inaccurate,’ Very Expensive, and Seriously Controversial VOTING MACHINES, which cost Ten Times more than accurate and sophisticated Watermark Paper, which is faster, and leaves NO DOUBT, at the end of the evening, as to who WON, and who LOST, the Election,” Mr. Trump wrote.
Nearly a third of voters, 30.3%, cast their ballots in the 2024 election by mail, according to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission.
That’s down from a high of 43% during the 2020 election but above pre-pandemic levels.
For years, Mr. Trump has complained that mail-in votes make it difficult to tell who won races on Election Night. He’s also been clear about his belief that Democrats use mail-in ballots to tilt elections in their favor.
“Democrats are virtually Unelectable without using this completely disproven Mail-In SCAM,” he wrote.
Mr. Trump signed an executive order in March that would require states to copy practices in other developed countries, namely the widespread use of paper ballots and a requirement that all votes are counted by Election Day, as designated by the federal government.
