President Donald Trump said he will bring “honesty” to the 2026 elections through an executive order eliminating mail-in ballots and voting machines.
Trump has long opposed voting by mail or electronically, particularly since his 2020 election loss. During his second presidential run, he repeatedly said there was widespread voter fraud.
On Monday, Trump said the United States is the only country that uses mail-in voting and that all other countries “gave it up because of the MASSIVE VOTER FRAUD ENCOUNTERED.”
More than two dozen countries, including Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, and South Korea, have postal voting systems, with some dating back to the 1990s. Countries with right-wing governments, such as Italy, also offer limited mail-in voting. The U.S. has had a form of mail-in voting for centuries.
Countries such as Russia, France, and Portugal do not allow in-country mail-in voting. Trump recently said Russian President Vladimir Putin agrees that mail-in voting is not “honest.”
Trump blasted voting machines as highly inaccurate, very expensive, and highly controversial. He said they 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.”
He also predicted that his effort to remove mail-in voting and voting machines would be opposed by Democrats “BECAUSE THEY CHEAT AT LEVELS NEVER SEEN BEFORE,” and that they are “unelectable” without them.
Trump also noted that his orders are justified because the executive branch has power over the states.
“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.”
Eight states and the District of Columbia allow their elections to be entirely run by mail-in voting. Twenty-eight states allow mail-in voting without an excuse, and 14 others require a reason to vote absentee or by mail.
States often delegate their authority to county governments, allowing them to determine their own voting rules.
The Constitution allows state legislatures to make their own voting rules, subject to congressional oversight. It’s unclear whether a Trump executive order aimed at ending mail-in voting or electronic voting would stand up to legal challenges.
Trump concluded by saying a country without fair elections or a strong border does not resemble a real country.
He said in 2020 that mail-in voting was primed to encounter foreign influence.
“Mail-In Voting is already proving to be catastrophic. The Dems talk of foreign influence in voting, but they know that Mail-In Voting is an easy way for foreign countries to enter the race,” Trump said.
Following his 2020 election loss, Trump derided a “rigged” election process. The unrest from his claims led to the Jan. 6 Capitol riots, for which Congress impeached him.
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Many of Trump’s claims about the rigged election process came from quick Republican leads on election night that evaporated when more Democratic mail-in votes cut into leads across the country.
Experts believe voter fraud is rare in the U.S., and almost never influences an election’s outcome.