President Trump has passed the first 100 days of his second term. It should come as no surprise that the new administration is attacking voting and elections from all sides. As my colleague Joseph Reed wrote, their actions raise the question of whether we have a democracy anymore. Despite the onslaught of attacks, constitutional crises, and “jokes” about an unconstitutional third term, we still do—but we’ll need to watch vigilantly to keep it. Here are the ways Trump and his administration are already trying to dismantle our elections and undermine democracy.
The DOJ and voting rights
I’ve already written about Trump’s Department of Justice (DOJ) and his Attorney General, Pam Bondi–a former lawyer for the president and a 2020 election denier. President Trump also appointed Harmeet K. Dhillon to be the deputy attorney general in charge of the civil rights division, which is critical to protecting voting rights across the country. Dhillon, another 2020 election denier, has challenged multiple states’ voting rights policies and is, according to Democracy Docket, “one of the leading legal figures working to roll back voting rights across the country.” In the face of Dhillon’s leadership, hundreds of lawyers have left the civil rights division. Dozens more senior personnel in the division were reassigned.
Under this administration, the DOJ has abandoned several voting rights cases. As I predicted in my earlier blog, the DOJ dropped its lawsuit challenging Georgia’s controversial 2021 law in March that, among other things, bans giving voters food and water while they wait in line, and shortened the time voters have to request absentee ballots. In April, the DOJ also pulled out of another lawsuit–one challenging Hazelton, Pennsylvania’s city council election system. (While Latinx voters comprise about two-thirds of Hazelton’s some 30,000 population, no Latinx people have been elected to the city council. The DOJ initially argued that, because city council seats are selected at large instead of being elected by district and because of substantial language access barriers, Latinx voting power is diluted in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.)
Instead of pursuing cases that seek to protect voters’ rights, Trump’s DOJ is instead shifting its focus to debunked conspiracy theories like mass voter fraud and non-citizen voting. The civil rights division voting section’s new mission statement almost completely ignores the Voting Rights Act and instead emphasizes misinformation: “The mission of the Voting Rights Section of the DOJ Civil Rights Division is to ensure free, fair, and honest elections unmarred by fraud, errors, or suspicion. The Section will work to ensure that only American citizens vote in US federal elections and do so securely. Other section priorities include preventing illegal voting, fraud, and other forms of malfeasance and error.” At the same time, Trump has directed the DOJ to help release Tina Peters, an election denier who in 2021 allowed unauthorized individuals into the Mesa County Colorado election office and used the identity of a software engineer she stole to copy election data to post online. She was subsequently found guilty of multiple felonies and sentenced to nine years in prison.
In March 2025, President Trump signed an executive order claiming to set a new requirement for voters to provide documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote in federal elections, which my colleague Lisa van Theemsche covered here (similar to but distinct from the Congress’ misleadingly named SAVE Act which I discussed in this blog post). Apart from the proof of citizenship provisions, the order also created a new deadline for mail ballots to be counted. Under the standard set by this executive order, ballots must be received by Election Day to be counted instead of the previous and more flexible practice of accepting ballots postmarked by Election Day but received later. Finally, the order directed states to share their voter rolls with the federal government.
Instituting a proof of citizenship requirement is not only not under the discretion for the president but could also be deeply detrimental to access to elections. Millions of eligible voters, especially young, lower-income, and people of color, could be prevented from voting under such a requirement. Quickly after its signing, the executive order was criticized for executive overreach—after all, these kinds of rules belong to Congress and the states under the Constitution—and a coalition of voting rights organization filed a lawsuit. A federal court has placed a temporary injunction that is preventing the Trump administration from implementing the proof of citizenship requirement for now.
EAC and election security
Trump’s dubious proof-of-citizenship executive order directed the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) –an independent and bipartisan federal agency tasked with helping state and local election officials administer elections–to add a proof-of-citizenship requirement to registration forms.
Unfortunately, the EAC has signaled its intentions to follow President Trump’s direction on other matters. Recently, in response to Trump’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) EO, the EAC informed state and local election officials that they would need to sign a statement that they do not “operate any programs promoting DEI that violate any applicable Federal anti-discrimination laws” to get security grant funding. However, the statement leaves what constitutes as a DEI program or initiative undefined.
In President Trump’s second term, the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA) housed in the Department of Homeland Security has had 300 contracts cancelled and has faced substantial funding cuts, including halting all election security programs. In the past, CISA provided physical and cybersecurity guidance and helped counter election disinformation and foreign interference in elections.
Among the cutbacks at CISA was the dissolution of “red teams” who were responsible for assessing vulnerabilities in state and local election systems. Furthermore, in February, DOGE fired 130 probationary workers from CISA, and former CISA Director Chris Krebs was fired by the president after he publicly rejected false claims that President Trump won the 2020 presidential election. Now, Trump administration officials say that Krebs is being investigated, though they will not disclose why. Recently, the Trump administration proposed cutting nearly $500 billion dollars from CISA’s budget, primarily by eliminating the agency’s work in election disinformation.
Before its defunding, CISA had ushered in an era of increased federal-state government collaboration to secure elections. State officials say that despite this setback, they remain fully committed to election security but note that the lack of federal government resources poses risks to state elections. Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes said it “raises serious concerns for the security of Arizona’s elections going forward.” CISA’s role in future elections remains unclear, but for now, it will no longer help monitor election dis- and misinformation.
The Census Bureau
On his very first day back in office, President Trump rescinded a Biden executive order that stated that all U.S. residents, not just citizens, were to be counted in the U.S. census. House Representative Chuck Edwards re-introduced a bill in the House to add a citizenship question to the census. The Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that a citizenship question—pushed by President Trump during his first term—violated federal law and barred its addition to the 2020 census. The census is vitally important to political representation and, consequently, political power and the distribution of resources in the U.S. Questions related to citizenship could result in even worse undercounting of historically underrepresented groups, like Latinx populations, than previous censuses.
Members of some of these communities belong to what are referred to as hard-to-count (HTC) and historically undercounted populations (HUPs). According to the census, populations are categorized as HTC “when our traditional methods of counting may not be sufficient to fully include them in the census.” These populations can be difficult to locate, contact, persuade to participate, or interview for various reasons such as low civic engagement, language barriers, health issues, distrust, or even lack of internet. Racial and ethnic minorities as well as those who speak languages other than English are commonly HTC, and Black, American Indian or Alaska Native, and Hispanic/Latino communities are among the HUPs. In other words, these groups often fall within HTC and HUP populations because of systemic challenges and the legacy of racism in our country’s political history.
While the 2020 census was largely accurate, accuracy wasn’t uniform across racial groups. It is estimated that the 2020 census overcounted White household populations by 1.6% (up from 0.8% in 2010). In fact, the overcount of White and Asian households was more pronounced in 2020 than in 2010. Meanwhile, Black and Latinx households were undercounted by 3.3% and 5.0%, respectively—again, higher than the estimated undercounts of these populations in the 2010 census. To put that into context, that is more than three million, or 1 in 20, Latinx people who were not counted by the 2020 census.
This matters because census data is what is used in congressional reapportionment, or the process of determining how many seats states get in the House of Representatives. Moreover, census data is used by state legislatures in redistricting. Altogether, it means that because they are undercounted, historically marginalized communities receive less political representation. Not only that, but census data also helps the government decide where to allocate monies to states and localities and aids public service planning. In 2021, 353 federal assistance programs used Census Bureau data, including the decennial census, to decide how to distribute over $2.8 trillion in federal funds, $700 billion of which was spent on the federal response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Inaccurate census population counts “can send billions of dollars to the wrong locations.” Inaccurate counts mean that communities in need may see reductions in the amount of money the federal government distributes to critical programs like Medicaid and school lunch programs.
But Trump is not just targeting the census itself. He is also aiming at the agency responsible for carrying out the census and other important research critical to political representation and equality in the country, the U.S. Census Bureau. President Trump directed the Census Bureau to remove questions about gender identity from its surveys in response to Trump’s Executive Order 14151, “Ending Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs And Preferencing.” In addition to being discriminatory, this EO also ignores established science which says that sex and gender exist on a spectrum and are not either-or concepts. In its attempt to comply with this order, the Census Bureau asked for permission to remove gender identity questions from the Household Trends and Outlook Pulse Survey. In February, respondents of the National Crime Victimization Survey, a survey that is used by the US Bureau of Justice Statistics and fielded by Census Bureau employees, were not asked questions related to gender identity. Like population counts, accurate data on gender is important to governmental policymaking. Data on “gender, race, ethnic origin, relationship, and tenure—are critical for evaluating the fairness and effectiveness of government policies,” according to the American Bar Association.
The Census Bureau has also terminated three federal advisory committees: the 2030 Census Advisory Committee (2030 CAC), the Census Scientific Advisory Committee (CSAC), and the National Advisory Committee (NAC). You can learn more about federal advisory committees and how they have been during Trump’s second term in my colleague Jules Barbati Dajches’ blog post. Members of the 2030 CAC, who were tasked with providing guidance on how the census can have an accurate and inclusive count, were appointed less than a year before the committee was dissolved. 2030 CAC’s chair, Arturo Vargas, said he was “dumbfounded” when he learned about the committee’s elimination. He went further, articulating the importance of these advisory committees: “When the bureau gets advice from external stakeholders, it’s able to correct course, and perhaps even consider the unintended consequences of some of its plans when it receives important feedback from the community.”
According to Census Bureau’s website, “The Secretary of Commerce has determined that the purposes for which the 2030 Census Advisory Committee was established have been fulfilled…” The CSAC, which helped ensure that the Census Bureau’s research practices were scientifically accurate, was made up of a collection of experts in fields such as sociology, engineering, public policy, communications, social work and public health, statistics, and demography. The Census Bureau website had a similar statement about its termination. And finally, the NAC, designed to provide guidance on how to “reach racial, ethnic, and other populations—aging, immigrant, rural, and tribal, etc.—and those affected by natural disasters” was also terminated in late February.
It’s time to pay attention and act
President Trump isn’t just targeting voting and elections, of course. My colleague Jules Barbati-Dajches has been tracking Trump’s attacks on science, expanding upon UCS’ extensive database documenting these attacks. Other colleagues here at UCS have also tracked the Trump administration’s attacks against housing policy, disaster response and preparedness, environmental justice programs, public health, and more. The attacks on voting and fair representation are especially disturbing, because elections are how we can hold leaders accountable for the harm they cause.
Progress isn’t linear. We owe it to ourselves and future generations to fight back. We’ve assembled science-based recommendations for how to actually restore trust in elections and make sure everyone can participate, and you can encourage your state to adopt them. You can keep up to date with the latest developments in the Trump administration through our blog series and our Save Science Save Lives campaign. You can also attend local town halls and use UCS’ Town Hall Toolkit to voice your support for science and scientists and help hold your elected officials accountable. If you or someone who know is a federal scientist, contractor, or worker, here are resources to help. You can also join the UCS Science Network to use your expertise to fight for science and science-based decisions to protect our health, safety, environment, and democracy. Finally, share your story if you have seen or experienced the benefits of federal science and research.