President Donald Trump pledged Monday that he will try to eliminate mail-in voting, after telling Fox News that authoritarian Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed with him on the subject during their meeting last week.
Despite lacking any sort of constitutional power on the matter, Trump declared in a Truth Social post that he would sign an executive order to “help bring HONESTY to the 2026 Midterm Elections,” and attempt to strip states of their independent authority to oversee elections, and is demanding they just do what he tells them to.
“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,” the president wrote, referencing conservatives’ disproven claims and conspiracies regarding voter fraud in the 2020 election, which he lost.
“Remember, the States are merely an ‘agent’ for the Federal Government in counting and tabulating the votes. 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,” he added. “ELECTIONS CAN NEVER BE HONEST WITH MAIL IN BALLOTS/VOTING…THE MAIL-IN BALLOT HOAX, USING VOTING MACHINES THAT ARE A COMPLETE AND TOTAL DISASTER, MUST END, NOW!!!”
Of course, the president does not have the power to unilaterally strip states of their constitutionally guaranteed right to conduct and oversee elections, and any executive order purporting to do so will likely face immediate court challenges.
The post came days after Trump told Fox News’ Sean Hannity that Putin — who hasn’t participated in a free and fair election in decades — agreed with him on the need to eliminate mail-in voting during their meeting last week.
“Vladimir Putin said something — one of the most interesting things — he said, ‘your election was rigged because you have mail-in voting,’” Trump recounted. “He said … ‘it’s impossible to have mail-in voting and have honest elections.”
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“We talked about 2020,” Trump continued. “He said ‘You won that election by so much,’ … and he said and ‘if you would have won, we wouldn’t have had a war, you’d have all these millions of people alive now instead of dead,’ and he said ‘you lost it because of mail-in voting, it was a rigged election.’”
There is no evidence that the use of mail-in ballots or digital voting machines is conducive to widespread electoral fraud. Though mail-in voting has historically skewed Democratic, Republicans rely on it as well, including in states like Florida, where Trump voted early last year. Nevertheless, eliminating mail-in voting has been a goal of the president’s for some time now.
While it might be clear to most that the Russian autocrat was quite clearly making a play to stroke Trump’s ego, the president has pushed Republicans at home to restrict access to mail-in and early voting, with significant success. Since 2020, at least 29 states implemented more stringent restrictions on voter registrations and identification requirements, or attempted to limit early and absentee voting. According to a 2024 analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice, at least 25 states enacted 43 mail voting restrictions between 2020 and 2024.
So while Trump may not legally be able to change state voting laws with the stroke of a pen, plenty of lawmakers across the country are ready and willing to cooperate with his anti-democratic agenda.
Election conspiracist Mike Lindell hailed Trump’s social media post in a conversation with Rolling Stone.
“It’s a great day for America, isn’t it?” he says. “I’ve been talking this for four-and-a half years, 12 hours a day, so this is a big deal. I’ve been talking about melting down the voting machines and turning them into prison bars — it’s been the total focus of my life for four-and-a-half years. I last spoke to the president about this in June, maybe? Whenever I’m at the White House, I bring it up…I’ve been to White House three times this year, and of course I speak to him when I’m there. I don’t tell him anything I don’t tell you which is: We got to get computers out of elections.”
Lindell continues, “Did I have an influence on this? That’s up to you to decide. Did I sound the alarm every day for four and a half years? Yes, absolutely. I don’t need to take any credit; I give God the glory.”
The close Trump ally and pillow mogul adds: “This is one of the most important days in the history of our country. It’s one of the most important things President Donald Trump will ever do. I have been fighting uni-party Republicans on this for years.”
Whatever Lindell’s level of influence on this matter, when he talks, the president at least listens.
According to other sources with direct knowledge of the matter, Trump privately tells people that whenever Lindell sees him, he brings up “the machines,” and says that Lindell has been relentless on this matter in ways that nobody else is.
From Rolling Stone US
