Colorado: Trump calls for former county clerk Tina Peters to be released from prison | Katie Langford/The Denver Post

President Donald Trump on Monday called for former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters to be released from prison, where she is serving a nine-year sentence for a voting data scheme related to the 2020 presidential election. Peters is a “political prisoner” and “hostage,” Trump said in a Monday night post on Truth Social, describing her case as “communist persecution by the radical left Democrats.” Peters’ case was prosecuted by a Republican district attorney and she was convicted of several felonies related to unauthorized access to state voting machines, including giving a security badge to a man associated with MyPillow chief executive Mike Lindell so the man could access Mesa County’s election system in an unsuccessful search for voter fraud. Read Article

Michigan Department of State says subpoenas for election training materials violate the law | Anna Liz Nichols/Michigan Advance

In response to Michigan House Republicans issuing subpoenas for copies of election-related training materials, the Michigan Department of State is asking lawmakers to narrow their request in the interest of election security. Members of the Republican-led House Oversight Committee issued subpoenas last month ordering Democrat Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson to turn over educational and training documents used in preparing clerks and poll workers to oversee elections, which Benson’s office said Wednesday would be a violation of the law. The subpoena is the latest maneuver in a months-long effort by House Republicans to obtain copies of training materials, beginning with Rep. Rachelle Smit (R-Martin) requesting them late last year, before she became chair of the House Election Integrity Committee. Read Article

North Carolina: New Republican majority on elections board replaces the executive director | Lynn Booner/NC Newsline

The new Republican majority on the state Board of Elections in its first meeting voted to replace elections Executive Director Karen Brinson Bell with Sam Hayes, general counsel to House Speaker Destin Hall. This is the first state elections board with members appointed by the state Auditor. In the past, a majority of the election board’s members were of the same political party as the governor. After Democrat Josh Stein won the governorship last year, the Republican legislative supermajority passed a law stripping governors of their power to appoint members. That lead to the new majority-Republican elections board. Read Article

North Carolina: Republican concedes long-unsettled Supreme Court election to Democratic incumbent | Gary D. Robertson/Associated Press

The Republican challenger for a North Carolina Supreme Court seat conceded last November’s election on Wednesday to Democratic incumbent Allison Riggs, two days after a federal judge ruled that potentially thousands of disputed ballots challenged by Jefferson Griffin must remain in the final tally. In a statement provided by his campaign, Griffin said he would not appeal Monday’s decision by U.S. District Judge Richard Myers, who also ordered that the State Board of Elections certify results that after two previous recounts showed Riggs is the winner by 734 votes from over 5.5 million ballots cast in the race. Griffin’s decision sets the stage for Riggs to be officially elected to an eight-year term as an associate justice in the nation’s ninth-largest state. Read Article

Oregon’s access to federal election security funds at risk | Anastasia Mason/Salem Statesman Journal

Oregon could lose out on $272,727 in election security funding from the U.S. Election Assistance Commission following updated requirements that states agree to follow an executive order from President Donald Trump on diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Secretary of State Tobias Read said he has not yet decided whether he will sign the agreement. “We really can’t make a decision until we know more, because the Trump administration has not done a good job of writing these requirements in a way that’s understandable,” Read told the Statesman Journal. “It’s not clear what they mean by ‘DEI,’ for example.” Read Article

Pennsylvania: Why election policy is still one of Harrisburg’s thorniest issues | Stephen Caruso and Carter Walker/Spotlight PA

For two decades, disputes over voter identification have sunk attempts to rewrite Pennsylvania’s badly outdated election law. But in recent years, prominent Democrats have offered tentative support for stricter rules. In March, state House Speaker Joanna McClinton (D., Philadelphia), a longtime opponent, publicly said she is open to expanding voter ID requirements as long as they don’t make it harder for people to vote. That’s a position echoed by Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro. In theory, Democratic support for a GOP priority should make it easier for Pennsylvania’s divided legislature to reach a deal that brings the state’s Election Code into the 21st century. The reality is much more complicated. Read Article

Texas House OKs bill allowing election judges to carry guns | Stephen Simpson/The Texas Tribune

Texas House lawmakers debated gun rights and voter protections Wednesday afternoon related to a bill that would allow election judges to carry a weapon inside a polling place at any time. House Bill 1128, by Rep. Carrie Isaac, R-Dripping Springs, allows an election judge, early voting clerk, or deputy early voting clerk who is serving as an election judge to carry a concealed handgun at an early voting or Election Day polling place as a means of protection for themselves and others. House lawmakers passed the bill 85 to 57 on Thursday, advancing it to the Senate. This bill would codify a decision made by Attorney General Ken Paxton in 2018, where he ruled that since district judges can carry firearms to polling places and election judges had been given the authority of district judges, they should also be able to. ​​Paxton’s opinion explains why a court would take his side in the decision, but it was not legally binding. Read Article

Wisconsin towns want to appoint election clerks instead of electing them | Alexander Shur/Votebeat

A couple of years ago, Lorraine Beyersdorff was ready to retire from her job as clerk of the Town of Texas, Wisconsin, after 34 years of service. “I will not run again,” she said in a community Facebook post in late 2022. “Nomination papers can be circulated for signatures beginning December 1st. If interested, call me for more information.” About a dozen people thanked her for a job well done. But no one filed nomination papers. Nobody called. And because of a quirk in Wisconsin law, no one from outside of the 1,600-person town could take the job. State law requires all elected town clerks — and the appointees that replace clerks departing mid-term — to live in the town where they serve. Beyersdorff, 73, knew there was another option: The town could switch from electing its clerk to appointing one. That would allow officials to consider candidates from outside the town’s borders. Read Article

National: House appropriators have reservations — or worse — about proposed CISA cuts | Tim Starks/CyberScoop

House appropriators on Tuesday challenged proposed budget cuts for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, with Democrats saying the Trump administration was disturbingly moving money away from the agency and a key Republican saying he needed to see justifications for the reductions. The Trump administration has proposed cutting CISA funding by $491 million, and some members of a House Appropriations subcommittee raised doubts about that idea during testimony from Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. Specific details for those budget cuts weren’t released in the so-called “skinny budget” last week. Homeland Security subcommittee chair Rep. Mark Amodei, R-Nev., said that at a time when leading Hill voices and others are saying China is getting the better of the United States in cyberspace and as CISA personnel cuts are already underway, appropriators need more information on the budget proposal. Read Article

National: As of Today, the FEC Can’t Enforce Campaign Finance Laws — and That’s Only One of Its Problems | Daniel I. Weiner/Brennan Center for Justice

Starting today, the bipartisan Federal Election Commission won’t be able to do its job. That’s because the independent agency, which oversees money in campaigns for federal office, will no longer have the minimum four required members to do most business. The loss of quorum is due to the resignation of a Republican appointee, coupled with President Trump’s unprecedented move in February to fire a Democratic appointee. Such a shortfall has only happened three other times in the FEC’s 50-year history, including twice during Trump’s first term. Read Article

National: Trump’s justice department appointees remove leadership of voting unit | Sam Levine/The Guardian

Donald Trump’s appointees at the Department of Justice have removed all of the senior civil servants working as managers in the department’s voting section and directed attorneys to dismiss all active cases, according to people familiar with the matter, part of a broader attack on the department’s civil rights division. The moves come less than a month after Trump ally Harmeet Dhillon was confirmed to lead the civil rights division, created in 1957 and referred to as the “crown jewel” of the justice department. In an unusual move, Dhillon sent out new “mission statements” to the department’s sections that made it clear the civil rights division was shifting its focus from protecting the civil rights of marginalized people to supporting Trump’s priorities. Read Article

Michigan Democrats’ election proposals sidestep noncitizen-voting issue | Hayley Harding/Votebeat

Michigan Democrats introduced their first pieces of legislation to respond to what they consider overly aggressive Republican proposals to improve election security. As proposed, the package of bills under the Michigan Election Security Act won’t close the voter registration loopholes that may have allowed at least one noncitizen to cast a ballot that counted last year. And the bills omit the measures Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson suggested in February as a way to prevent noncitizens from casting ballots in Michigan’s elections. In fact, the initial bills do little to directly address the threat of noncitizen voting, which Republicans have made a top priority since taking control of the House in January. Read Article

National: People should be ‘outraged’ by efforts to shrink federal cyber teams, former CISA head says | David DiMolfetta/Nextgov/FCW

Chris Krebs, the former Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security director who defied President Donald Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud in 2020 and was subsequently fired, said on Monday that the cybersecurity community should be outraged at changes the second Trump administration is making to cybersecurity staff in the federal government. “Cybersecurity is national security. We all know that, right? That’s why we’re here,” he said while speaking to a room of security practitioners on a panel at the RSAC Conference in San Francisco. “That’s why we get up every morning and do our jobs. We are protecting everyone out there. And right now, to see what’s happening to the cybersecurity community inside the federal government, we should be outraged, absolutely outraged,” he added, which was met with applause across the room. Read Article

National: 100 days in, Trump’s moves to overhaul election law get pushback from courts, Democrats | Niels Lesniewski/Roll Call

On March 25, the president issued an executive order outlining new federal actions, including making available Social Security database information for states to verify voter eligibility and directing Attorney General Pamela Bondi to “take appropriate action” against states that “fail to comply with the list maintenance requirements of the National Voter Registration Act and the Help America Vote Act.” But as with many of the president’s moves, federal court challenges and constitutional questions abound. On April 25, a federal judge in Washington, D.C., put on hold key provisions of Trump’s order, including a directive to the Election Assistance Commission to make changes to the national mail voter registration form to require proof of citizenship. “The President is free to state his views about what policies he believes that Congress, the EAC, or other federal agencies should consider or adopt,” Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly wrote. “But, in this case, the President has done much more than state his views: He has issued an ‘Order’ directing that an independent commission ‘shall’ act to ‘require’ changes to an important document, the contents of which Congress has tightly regulated.” Read Article

National: Fox’s false claims about 2020 race was an audience strategy, Smartmatic says | Sarah Ellison and Scott Nover/The Washington Post

Smartmatic accused Fox News in a court filing Wednesday of embracing false claims that the voting technology company had helped steal the 2020 election for Joe Biden only after the network endured an audience backlash for calling the race in Arizona for Biden. Smartmatic, which makes voting machines and election management systems, has been engaged in a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News and its parent company, Fox Corp., since 2021. The lawsuit stems from on-air comments that Fox News hosts and guests made around the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Smartmatic has alleged that Fox News “decimated” the company’s business and marred its reputation with its false claims of election interference. Read Article

National: Cyber grant uncertainty puts state programs in limbo, GAO report shows | Colin Wood/StateScoop

Some state and local government agencies are unsure how they will continue to fund their cybersecurity initiatives in absence of federal support, according to a report published Tuesday by the Government Accountability Office. Over the past year, the office examined the $1 billion, 4-year State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program, by randomly sampling state and territorial government agencies that have received funding. It found that most agencies had positive things to say about the program, and some agency representatives selected for interviews by the federal office reported concerns with how they’ll continue their cybersecurity initiatives after the program’s one-time funding runs out, or if it’s prematurely ended. The findings mirror what many technology officials and industry analysts have been saying during the first three months of the Trump administration, which has slashed hundreds of positions at the Department of Homeland Security and its Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, with plans to cut hundreds more. Read Article

Arizona GOP passes ‘impossible’ voting bill requiring 4,000 new polling locations | Caitlin Sievers/Arizona Mirror

Republican lawmakers passed legislation that would cost Arizona counties tens of millions of dollars every election year and would force them to attempt to find 4,000 new voting locations, something that county election officials described as impossible. House Bill 2017 passed through the Senate by a 17-12 party line vote on Tuesday. Sponsored by Rep. Rachel Keshel, a Tucson Republican and member of the far-right Arizona Freedom Caucus, the proposal would ban in-person early voting and the use of vote centers where any registered voter within a county can cast a ballot. Instead, it would require the use of precincts capped at 1,000 registered voters apiece. Most counties use voting centers, which allow any registered voter to show up and cast a ballot at any polling site in the county. Under the precinct model, only voters assigned to a precinct can vote there, and if they vote at the wrong location, their ballot won’t be counted. Read Article

Arizona: American-made voting equipment might not be ready by 2029 | Howard Fischer/Arizona Capitol Times

On party-line votes, both the Republican controlled House and Senate have approved legislation spelling out that, beginning that year, the Secretary of State’s Office cannot certify vote-recording and vote-tabulating equipment unless each and every part of the machine, including all components and software, are “sourced from the United States.” House Bill 2651 also says the equipment must be assembled in the United States. The measure now goes to Gov. Katie Hobbs. The only thing is, there are no voting tabulation machines available that meet those conditions according to Jenn Marson, a lobbyist for the Arizona Association of Counties. And it is her organization’s members who would have to comply. She told lawmakers there are probably companies that could meet the deadline. But the problem, Marson said, comes down to this: What if they can’t? Read Article

Arizona: As Cochise County trial approaches, a judge throws out rules for certifying elections | Jen Fifield/Votebeat

When two Republican Cochise County supervisors delayed their certification of the county’s 2022 election results, a judge forced them to certify, pointing to language in Arizona’s election manual that says they have no choice. A state grand jury later charged the two supervisors with two felonies — conspiracy, and interference with the secretary of state’s duty to certify the election. And two secretaries of state have sought to make the rules about supervisors’ duties more explicit. A recent court ruling, though, challenges the long-held presumption in Arizona that supervisors have no discretion when certifying election results. The court threw out that section of the Elections Procedures Manual entirely, saying it goes further than the statute supports. Read Article

Colorado lawmakers approve voting rights bill, despite pushback from election officials | Chas Sisk/Aspen Public Radio

Colorado lawmakers are sending the governor a measure meant to shore up voting rights. The move is part of a national effort to write protections established by the federal Voting Rights Act into state laws. But it comes despite opposition from local officials, who have argued the law could upend decades-old practices. Backers cite the gradual weakening of the Voting Rights Act and recent attacks from the Trump administration on state voting laws to argue that there’s a need for state legislation. But pushback has come from local officials, including some representing progressive parts of the state. They say the measure could reopen settled legal questions about voting practices that some could argue are discriminatory. Those include electing officials at large, which can keep minority candidates out of office, and holding local elections in the spring or summer, when turnout tends to be lower. Read Article

Michigan voter proof-of-citizenship effort fails on first House vote | Hayley Harding/Votebeat

An attempt to get a proof-of-citizenship requirement for would-be voters onto the 2026 ballot failed along party lines Thursday in the Michigan House — a blow to the GOP-backed effort, but likely not the final word. The measure would require new Michigan voters — and almost certainly some current ones — to provide documents proving they are U.S. citizens before they can cast a ballot in the state. The measure’s sponsor, state Rep. Bryan Posthumus, a Republican from Rockford, said the resolution “is a common-sense way to close a massive loophole in our current system.” Read Article

Mississippi appealing mail-in absentee ballot ruling to U.S. Supreme Court  | Taylor Vance/Mississippi Today

Mississippi officials are appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court a federal court ruling that struck down Mississippi’s five-day grace period for mail-in absentee ballots to arrive after Election Day. Attorneys for the state filed court documents stating their intention to petition the nation’s highest court to overturn a decision from an appellate court that found a state election law conflicted with federal election laws. U.S. District Judge Louis Guirrola halted all lower court action until the proceedings with the Supreme Court are completed. Read Article

North Carolina: Court of Appeals clears path for Republicans to take over Board of Elections. Stein to appeal | Will Doran/WRAL

Control over elections administration in North Carolina could flip from Democratic to Republican control within hours, following a decision late Wednesday from the state Court of Appeals. Elections decisions in North Carolina are made by political appointees, who make calls on issues such as where and when to open early voting sites, which allegations of campaign finance violations or voter fraud to refer to prosecutors, and whether to confirm election results. Last week, a trial court ruled that Republican state lawmakers violated the constitution when they tried taking control of the elections board away from Democratic Gov. Josh Stein. Read Article

North Carolina: Griffin’s case could open an ‘Pandora’s Box’ for election law | Ned Barnett/Raleigh News & Observer

The legal effort to overturn the results of North Carolina’s 2024 state Supreme Court race is an affront to all of the state’s voters, but it potentially also could provide a blueprint for overturning election results in other states. At issue is a lawsuit by Court of Appeals Judge Jefferson Griffin, who lost his bid to unseat Justice Allison Riggs by 734 votes out of 5,540,090 votes cast. Griffin asked that more than 65,000 votes be tossed because of flaws in the voters’ registration, the lack of photo ID on military and overseas absentee ballots and a lack of state residency by some voters. The Griffin lawsuit has ping-ponged between state and federal courts for nearly six months and is currently pending in federal court. Ultimately, this case could endure all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, where the 6-3 Republican majority might uphold Griffin’s attempt to change the rules that govern an election after the election. Read Article

Ohio: Security concern forces half of state’s counties to use paper pollbooks for May election | Anna Staver/The Cleveland Plain Dealer

A security violation involving an electronic pollbook in Perry County is prompting half of Ohio counties to check voters in using paper pollbooks for the May 6 election. The device–a tablet-style electronic similar to an iPad–was intended to check voters in on Election Day. Perry County never used it for an election. Instead, local officials reported irregularities that “violated Ohio’s election security standards. I’ve directed our Election Integrity Unit and cybersecurity team to work with the Perry County Board of Elections to analyze the equipment purchased by the board… ,” Secretary of State Frank LaRose said in a statement. “As an added precaution, I’m directing the boards of elections who use this specific style of pollbook to use paper pollbooks for the May election.” Read Article

Texas attempts to revive voter assistance restrictions | Gabriel Tynes/Courthouse News Service

Parties on opposite sides of Texas’ strict new election access law appeared before a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday, attempting to resolve claims the measure violates Section 208 of the Voting Rights Act. After presiding over a six-week bench trial in October 2024, U.S. District Judge Xavier Rodriguez determined that it does, declaring that Texas’ restrictions on voting assistance unlawfully narrow voters’ federally protected rights. As a result, several provisions of Senate Bill 1 were struck down or enjoined. On Wednesday, three attorneys for state defendants argued the lower court wrongfully struck down the rules by misinterpreting Section 208, which they say permits reasonable, generally applicable regulations and does not preempt Texas’ safeguards against fraud, coercion and abuse in the voting process. Read Article

Wisconsin clerk who failed to count November votes violated multiple policies, investigators say | Todd Richmond/Associated Press

The former clerk who somehow failed to count nearly 200 ballots in Wisconsin’s capital city didn’t break any laws but did violate multiple policies and her contractual duty to supervise elections and maintain professional standards, the results of a city-led investigation released Tuesday show. Madison City Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl resigned earlier this month amid city and state investigations into her conduct during the November elections. She said in a message to The Associated Press that she hadn’t seen the investigation’s findings and declined to comment. According to the investigation, Dane County canvassers discovered 68 uncounted absentee ballots in a tabulator bin on Nov. 12, a week after the election, and another 125 uncounted ballots in a courier bag the first week of December. Read Article

Wyoming lawmakers, Gray still harping on election integrity | Legislature | Jasmine Hall/Jackson Hole News and Guide

Election integrity will continue to be an issue for the Wyoming Legislature this year. The Joint Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Committee will kick off its first meeting of the legislative interim with an election demonstration from the county clerks and a presentation from Secretary of State Chuck Gray. As clerks work throughout the year with the committee, the County Clerks Association has four priorities: testing and auditing, security of election officials, voter list maintenance and absentee ballot security. Ervin also expects clerks to take on more of an active role than in the past and be “a little bit more outspoken.” The county clerks pushed back against assertions from the secretary of state and other critics about how they run elections.The association has set a standard of only testifying on whether the clerks could implement a bill, not whether they agreed or disagreed with a policy. Resad Article

National: Trump’s Executive Order on Proof of Citizenship for Elections Is Partly Blocked by Judge | Nick Corasaniti/The New York Times

A federal judge blocked part of an expansive executive order signed last month seeking to overhaul election laws, writing on Thursday that President Trump did not have the authority to require documentary proof of citizenship for all voters. “Our Constitution entrusts Congress and the states — not the president — with the authority to regulate federal elections,” wrote Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of the Federal District Court in Washington. She pointed to federal voting legislation being considered in Congress, adding that the president could not “short-circuit Congress’s deliberative process by executive order.” But the judge did not block another key part of the executive order that sought to force a deadline for mail ballots in federal elections by withholding federal funding from states that failed to comply with the deadline. She found that the Democrats who brought the legal challenge did not have standing to do so. The legal concerns with this provision, Judge Kollar-Kotelly wrote, are being considered in other cases brought by state attorneys general. Read Article

A little-known federal agency is at the center of Trump’s executive order to overhaul US elections | Christina A. Cassidy/Associated Press

Florida’s “hanging chads” ballot controversy riveted the nation during the 2000 presidential contest and later prompted Congress to create an independent commission to help states update their voting equipment. The U.S. Election Assistance Commission has operated in relative anonymity since, but is now central to President Donald Trump’s executive order seeking to overhaul elections. One of the commission’s boards will meet Thursday in North Carolina, the first commission-related meeting since the directives were announced. Among other things, Trump directed the agency to update the national voter registration form to add a proof of citizenship requirement. But whether the president can order an independent agency to act and whether the commission has the authority to do what Trump wants will likely be settled in court. Read Article