Questions raised over Auckland councillors receiving freebies from Eden Park and major changes are being proposed to electorates in the lower North Island. Video / NZ Herald, Getty
Experts say the order could disenfranchise millions and faces legal challenges over its constitutionality.
The order also seeks to bar late-arriving mail ballots and alter state voter registration processes.
US President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday (US time) requiring people to provide documents proving they are citizens when they register to vote, a mandate that experts said could prevent millions of Americans from voting.
The order reflects Trump’s long-standing fixation on election administration, as well as his baseless claims following the 2016 and 2020 presidential races that both were riddled with fraud, particularly illegal voting by non-citizens. There is no evidence widespread corruption, by non-citizens or others, tainted either contest.
Republicans in dozens of states have sought for decades to require voters to present identification to cast ballots, but Trump has taken that effort to a new level with an executive order establishing a federal mandate to provide proof of citizenship to register to vote.
The US 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 Trump was claiming power he does not have and that lawsuits over the measure were all but guaranteed.
“This executive order is unlawful,” said Wendy Weiser, vice-president for democracy at the Brennan Centre for Justice at New York University’s School of Law. “The president does not have the authority to require this. The president cannot override a statute passed by Congress that says what is required to register to vote on the federal voter registration form.”
US President Donald Trump meets with US ambassadors in the Cabinet Room at the White House on Tuesday, March 25 (US time). Photo / John McDonnell / Washington Post
Others suggested the order reflects Trump’s desire to expand executive power – and for the Supreme Court to allow it. His order directs the Election Assistance Commission – an agency governed by statute enacted by Congress – to change the federal voter registration form to require government-issued documentary proof of citizenship.
“The court is well on the way to establishing that all federal agencies must be conceived as within the executive branch, no matter how Congress denominates or structures them,” Richard Pildes, a constitutional law professor at New York University, wrote on a widely read election law blog.
Less clear is whether states would be required to adopt the federal form. States typically produce their own voter registration forms, and voters are free to use either to register in federal elections.
Order excludes birth certificates as proof of citizenship
Only citizens can vote in federal elections, but most states do not require voters to provide proof of citizenship. Instead, voters must sign statements swearing they are citizens. Non-citizens who sign such statements can be charged with crimes and deported.
The order allows voters to use passports or certain driver’s licences to prove citizenship, but not birth certificates. Separately, it also attempts to bar states from counting mail ballots that officials receive after election day. Last year, 18 states allowed mail ballots that arrived later so long as they were postmarked by election day.
Trump specified that he would withhold federal election funding from states that do not comply with the raft of directives included in his order.
“Election fraud – you’ve heard the term – we’ll end it, hopefully,” Trump said as he signed the measure, according to a video posted by the White House.
Weiser and others said the measure would disenfranchise millions of people who don’t have easy access to such documents.
“The aim here is voter suppression pure and simple,” UCLA law professor Rick Hasen wrote on the blog.
Like Weiser, Hasen questioned the legality of the measure since the President does not oversee the Election Assistance Commission.
Voting by non-citizens is exceedingly rare, academic and court reviews have found. Trump and other Republicans have been fixated on the issue and said they want to ensure only citizens vote. Republicans in Congress in recent years haven’t been able to enact legislation requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote. With his order, Trump is seeking to circumvent that impasse.
The change would hit a wide swathe of the electorate, including working-class and rural voters who make up a crucial part of Trump’s base. Many of those voters don’t have the credentials that would be needed to register to vote and live far from government offices that issue them.
It is not immediately clear that the order would thwart Democrats, whose base includes more migrants and people of colour, more than Republicans. Among other factors, research shows that recently naturalised citizens tend to keep their citizenship papers at hand.
Under another provision, the order requires states to use ballots that do not record votes with barcodes or QR codes. That would force some states to make costly changes to their election equipment.
Trump’s order also seeks to give the Department of Homeland Security and the US Postal Service the ability to review state voter lists. Election experts questioned the federal government’s power to do that work, noting Republican and Democratic election officials pushed back when a presidential commission during Trump’s first term sought copies of state voter rolls.
But what drew the most attention on Tuesday was the provision on citizenship. Republicans embraced it, and Democrats threatened to sue over it.
“This is a great first step for election integrity reform nationwide,” Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) said in a statement.
Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D) said attorneys in her office are reviewing the order.
“If the election denier-in-chief tries to interfere with our citizens’ right to vote, with this or any other action, we’ll see him in court,” she said in a statement.
Arizona for years has required voters to provide proof of citizenship to register to vote in state elections, but because of a Supreme Court ruling, the state has allowed people to register to vote in federal elections without such proof. Other Republican-led states, including Louisiana, New Hampshire and Wyoming, have recently passed registration laws modelled on Arizona’s.
The House, meanwhile, is poised to pass legislation requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote. It’s unclear whether that measure could make it through the Senate.
Unlike Trump’s order, the legislation would allow voters to use birth certificates to prove their citizenship. The White House did not immediately say why it excluded birth certificates from the list of documents that can prove citizenship, but Trump has sought to end birthright citizenship.
