Arizona: ICE at the polls: Republicans push plan to require agents at all polling places | Jerod MacDonald-Evoy/Arizona Mirror

Polling shows that Americans want to abolish U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement following the murders of two American citizens in Minnesota amid a violent surge to round up immigrants as part of President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda, but Arizona Republicans want to require ICE officers to be stationed at polling places this year. This week, the Arizona Senate will take up a proposal to force all 15 of the state’s counties to sign an agreement with ICE “to provide for a federal immigration law enforcement presence at each location within this state where ballots are cast or deposited.” The Senate Judiciary and Elections Committee is slated to take up the strike-everything amendment to Senate Bill 1570 either Wednesday or Friday. (The committee has scheduled nearly 60 bills for hearings over the two meetings, but it’s unknown which measures will be considered on which day. This is the final week for legislative committees to hear bills.) Read Article

Georgia: Fulton County lawsuit claims feds used ‘gross mischaracterizations’ to justify raid | Derek B. Johnson/CyberScoop

A former federal official who tested and certified voting machines used in Fulton County, Georgia for the 2020 presidential election told a court that the federal government misrepresented key facts and omitted exculpatory public evidence while seeking a warrant in last month’s law enforcement raid. The raid, carried out by the FBI and overseen by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, saw agents seize ballots and other documentation from the Fulton County election offices. A public affidavit cited five core allegations related to the county’s recordkeeping, electronic ballot image storage, and election night reporting. Authorities allege these issues point to a potential conspiracy to intentionally manipulate the vote count in favor of Democrat Joe Biden. Fulton County officials sued the federal government in response, arguing that the affidavit used to obtain a warrant for the raid “does not identify facts that establish probable cause that anyone committed a crime.” Read Afrticle

Mississippi: Lawmakers eye changes to in-person absentee voting | Derrion Arrington/Mississippi Independent

Both chambers of the legislature have each passed bills to overhaul the state’s in-person absentee voting process, setting up a cross-chamber negotiation that could reshape how Mississippians cast ballots before Election Day. Both bills seek to eliminate the longstanding ballot-envelope procedure that has governed in-person absentee voting for decades, replacing it with a machine-based tabulation system. But the two measures diverge on a critical question: How many days before an election should voters be permitted to cast their ballots? The House bill, H.B. 447, would retain the existing 45-day in-person absentee voting window while modernizing ballot processing. The Senate’s version would compress that period to 22 days, beginning roughly three weeks before an election and continuing until noon on the Saturday before Election Day. The Senate measure would also require that in-person absentee votes be counted alongside Election Day ballots, with results announced after the polls close at 7 p.m. Read Article

North Carolina letter sent by the State Board of Elections sparks voter registration confusion | Kyle Ingram/Raleigh News & Observer

A letter sent to 241,000 North Carolina voters about their registration status sparked confusion and worry among some, who flooded county election offices with hundreds of calls and visits amid an already busy primary election season. The letter, which was sent by the State Board of Elections in recent weeks, informed recipients that their voter registration lacked certain required identification information. It asked them to provide either a driver’s license number or the last four digits of their Social Security number to clear up the issue. What the letter did not say was that recipients would have their vote counted normally regardless of whether they responded or not. Kelly McPherson, director of the Dare County Board of Elections, said that in the days following the letter’s arrival, her office fielded over 100 phone calls and visits from voters worried that they were now ineligible to cast their ballot. Read Article

Oklahoma: Election Board decision to keep voter data private garners support | Emma Murphy/News From The States

A group of Oklahomans on Monday said they’re prepared to sue the federal government if they continue trying to push state leaders to release protected voter information. C.J. Webber-Neal, a member of Sooner State Party, said at a press conference outside the State Election Board offices that the Department of Justice does not need access to Oklahoman’s protected voter information, like Social Security numbers and driver’s license numbers. Continued requests for that information amount to government overreach and could disincentivize Oklahomans from participating in elections, he said. “I think that it does not even help with voter integrity because now voters are going to be concerned about voting,” Webber-Neal said. “So that’s going to cause voters maybe not to go vote because they know that the government is going to have that information and it might affect them adversely.” Read Article

Pennsylvania: Paper ballots OK’d for Westmoreland County  voters at $18K price tag | Rich Cholodofsky/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

Westmoreland County voters will again be able to cast paper ballots at the polls during this year’s primary and general elections. Republican commissioners Sean Kertes and Doug Chew on Thursday approved a contract with an estimated price tag of $18,275 to supply paper ballots at each of the county’s 306 voting precincts for the May 19 primary. Voters will continue to have an option to use the touch-screen voting machines at the polls. Commissioners authorized the paper ballot option for the first time during the last year’s general election, calling it a test run for a future where digital ballot marking devices, such as what has been used in Westmoreland County since 2020, will no longer be part of the Election Day process. Read Article

Texas: Gillespie County Republicans scale back hand-count amid staffing shortage | Natalia Contreras/The Texas Tribune

Gillespie County Republicans have scrapped plans to hand-count all of their 2026 primary ballots after failing to recruit enough workers — at least for early voting. The lack of manpower prompted party officials to vote last week to use the county’s voting equipment to tabulate thousands of ballots expected to be cast during the two weeks before Election Day on March 3. However, Gillespie Republicans still plan to hand-count ballots cast on Election Day, party officials told Votebeat. The effort has deepened a divide within the county party: Some members wish to ditch electronic voting equipment entirely and hand-count all ballots, while others trust that the county’s electronic voting equipment is safe and the process contains appropriate checks and balances. It’s a continuation of a long-running disagreement that began in 2024, when the county party first hand-counted primary ballots. Read Article

Wisconsin: In unhinged brief, GOP compares not giving the Trump DOJ voters’ personal data to Jim Crow | Yunior RivasDemocracy Docket

The Republican Party of Wisconsin filed a disturbing amicus brief Tuesday urging a federal court to force the Wisconsin Elections Commission to hand over the state’s unredacted voter rolls to Trump’s Justice Department. The Wisconsin GOP didn’t just file a typical “friend of the court” brief supporting the DOJ’s attempt to seize the state’s unredacted voter rolls. Instead, it delivered a culture war-addled screed complete with typographical errors, segregation-era comparisons, anti-immigrant panic and ad hominem attacks. Instead of leading with sober legal analysis, the 27-page brief opens with a quote from a “self-help” author, implying that defending privacy rights is an admission of guilt or obstruction. From the outset, the brief frames anyone opposing the federal demand as corrupt, dishonest or afraid of being exposed. Read Article

Wyoming Supreme Court dismisses attempt to remove secretary of state | Kamila Kudelska/Wyoming Public Media

The Wyoming Supreme Court agreed with a district court judge’s decision to dismiss an attempt to remove Secretary of State Chuck Gray from office on Feb. 13. Retired Laramie attorney Tim Newcomb sought to have Gray removed under Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, which bans state officials from having engaged in insurrection or rebellion, or given aid or comfort to those who have. Newcomb’s lawsuit alleged Gray provided “aid and comfort” to Jan. 6 insurrectionists who rioted at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. His original lawsuit was filed in Albany County’s Second Judicial District last February. That court ruled against Newcomb in August. He then appealed to the state’s high court. In the Supreme Court decision, justices agreed with the lower court that Newcomb failed to state a claim on which the dismissal could be granted. Read Article

National: States’ mistrust of Trump’s fraud crusade could hinder fight against foreign influence in elections, federal officials fear | Sean Lyngaas and Evan Perez/CNN

State and local election administrators’ growing suspicion of the Trump administration’s motives has triggered concerns among some federal officials that distrust of even routine moves by the FBI could hinder cooperation with states and give an opening for US adversaries trying to influence elections. An FBI official this week sent a standard email to top state election officials inviting them to discuss how federal agencies could help with securing the midterms. It’s a message that has gone out numerous times in the years since Russia’s 2016 influence campaign as the feds have looked to offer security resources for election administrators. But this email came a week after the FBI executed a search warrant at the elections office of Fulton County, Georgia, and seized ballots related to the 2020 election — a move that alarmed many election officials. And it came amid Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard’s move to study voting machines for security vulnerabilities as she tries to support President Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 contest was stolen from him. Read Article

National: After Trump attacks, voting machine company Dominion is forging ahead as Liberty Vote | Carrie Levine/Votebeat

On a freezing December day, Liberty Vote executive Robert Giles sat before the New Hampshire Ballot Law Commission to answer questions about a familiar company operating under an unfamiliar name. Until October, the company had been Dominion Voting Systems — one of just two vendors certified to sell voting systems in the state. Then, it was sold to a former election official named Scott Leiendecker and rebranded as Liberty Vote. State regulators required to sign off on changes wanted to know more about who and what, exactly, they were signing off on. As one ballot law commission member pointed out, in New Hampshire, “when we give somebody a liquor license for a little restaurant, they have to go through quite a bit of a background check before we’re able to provide that. So I think we’d like to know a little bit more.” Secretary of State David Scanlan, a Republican, said he and others had “some really hard questions” for the company. A commission member had a fundamental one. “Why did he acquire this company?” he asked, referring to Leiendecker. “You would have to ask him that question,” Giles replied. Read Article

National: GOP pushes ahead on strict voter ID bill ahead of midterm elections | Lisa Mascaro/Associated Press

House Republicans rushed to approve legislation on Wednesday that would impose strict new proof-of-citizenship requirements ahead of the midterm elections, a long shot Trump administration priority that faces sharp blowback in the Senate. The bill, called the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility, or SAVE America Act, would require Americans to prove they are citizens when they register to vote, mostly through a valid U.S. passport or birth certificate. It would also require a valid photo identification before voters can cast ballots, which some states already demand. It was approved on a mostly party-line vote, 218-213. Republicans said the legislation is needed to prevent voter fraud, but Democrats warn it will disenfranchise millions of Americans by making it harder to vote. Federal law already requires that voters in national elections be U.S. citizens, but there’s no requirement to provide documentary proof. Experts said voter fraud is extremely rare, and very few noncitizens ever slip through the cracks. Fewer than one in 10 Americans don’t have paperwork proving they are citizens. Read Article

National: Federalizing Elections: It’s Been Proposed Before. It Doesn’t Work | Donald F. Kettl/Governing

President Donald Trump startled both parties this month with his declaration that “the Republicans ought to nationalize the voting” in federal elections. When criticism of his statement arose on all sides, he doubled down. If states “can’t count the votes legally and honestly,” he said, “then somebody else should take over.” Trump’s argument for national control goes further than anything Republican presidents have ever broached, but there’s nothing new in Republican claims that Democrats steal elections. There’s the case of Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley in the 1960 presidential election, when Republican Richard Nixon was sure that Daley had taken the state — and the election — from him. At a Christmas party a few weeks after the election, Nixon told guests, “We won, but they stole it from us.” He had a point, but not a very strong one. Researchers since have concluded that there was fraud in Illinois, but not enough to tip the state. And even if Nixon had won Illinois, he still would not have had enough electoral votes to win the presidency. Read Article

National: ‘The trust has been absolutely destroyed’ – Some state election officials say they no longer trust their federal partners | Michael Scherer, Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, Sarah Fitzpatrick, and Jonathan Lemire/The Atlantic

The email that federal law enforcement sent this week to the nation’s top election administrators would have been routine just a few years ago. “Your election partners,” the Tuesday missive from FBI Election Executive Kellie Hardiman read, “would like to invite you to a call where we can discuss preparations for the cycle.” But multiple secretaries of state who received the document told us they viewed it as a threat, given recent events. The FBI had just seized 2020 election materials in Georgia, and President Trump had announced his desire to “nationalize” elections, a state responsibility under the U.S. Constitution. The Department of Justice has sued more than 20 states to obtain their election rolls, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence is conducting an investigation of U.S. voting technology. The upshot is that a yearslong partnership between state and federal authorities—in which the feds have provided assistance on election security and protected state and local voting systems from threats—is now in danger of falling apart. Instead of “partners,” some state authorities now view federal officials involved in election efforts with deep suspicion. “The trust,” Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows told us, “has been absolutely destroyed.” ‘Read Article

National: US surveillance, election cybersecurity and Tulsi Gabbard | Ann-Marie Corvin/Cybernews

Earlier this week, a US senator publicly warned about the expanding use of personal data by federal authorities while separately sending a brief, private letter to the director of the CIA. In a video posted on Instagram, and intended to reach a wide audience, Ross Wyden pointed to the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) practice of using surveillance technologies and data sources in enforcement activity. “ICE is using apps to collect biometric data on protesters,” he warned. “That means that they can track your location, where you go, what you do, and especially who you talk to.” Wyden also said the agency is purchasing location information from commercial data brokers and using motor-vehicle records obtained from state governments. “My investigators have found that ICE is using government data they collect from state Departments of Motor Vehicles,” Wyden said. “They are refusing to answer any questions of ours about how this data is being used.” Read Article

National: Alarm bells sound over Trump’s ‘take over the voting’ call | US voting rights | Sam Levine/The Guardian

Donald Trump set off alarm bells earlier this week with comments that his administration should “take over the voting” in some states in the run-up to the 2026 midterms, which followed an unprecedented FBI raid on an election office in Georgia. Although election experts say it’s clear the president doesn’t have authority over elections, they warn the president’s corrosive rhetoric leaves little doubt about his intent. For months, the Trump administration has stoked doubts about the integrity of American elections largely through lawsuits designed to create the impression states aren’t doing enough to keep ineligible voters off the rolls. That effort escalated significantly last week when the FBI raided the election office in Fulton county, Georgia and seized ballots, along with other materials, related to the 2020 election. Shortly after the raid, Trump escalated his attack even further, saying the federal government should take over elections. “The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over,’” he said during a recent interview with Dan Bongino, the former deputy FBI director who has returned to hosting a podcast. “We should take over the voting, the voting in at least many – 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.” Democracy experts believe there is no longer any doubt about Trump’s desire to interfere with this fall’s elections. Read Article

Arizona primary to move up 2 weeks under bipartisan legislation | Sasha Hupka/Votebeat

Arizona will permanently move up its state primary election date under a new law that will also give voters more time to fix signature problems on early ballots and codify where party observers may watch election activity. The Arizona House voted unanimously on Feb. 2 to pass the legislation, which will move the primary from the first Tuesday in August to the second-to-last Tuesday in July. That will ensure that election officials can meet federally mandated deadlines to send out general election ballots to military and overseas voters, even if a statewide recount delays the finalization of the primary results. The legislation passed the Arizona Senate with a similarly bipartisan vote on Thursday, and was signed by Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs on Friday. The 2026 primary election date will now move from Aug. 4 to July 21. Read Article

Delaware Elections Office asks for state funds increase after drop in federal support | Bente Bouthier/Delaware Public Media

Gov. Matt Meyer’s 2027 budget plan opted not to fund several requests from Delaware’s Dept. of Elections, such as expanded early voting locations and upgrades to its campaign finance reporting system. State Election Commissioner Anthony Albence told the Joint Finance Committee that funds for an updated campaign finance reporting system border on necessary. CFRS was implemented first in 2015, and the Office of Budget and Management said its approved updates to the system since then. Albence said that making tweaks to the current system is more expensive. Read Article

Georgia: FBI raid of Fulton County was driven by Trump appointee, court docs show | Chloe Atkins, Ryan J. Reilly, Jane C. Timm and Corky Siemaszko/NBC

The FBI last month raided a Georgia election hub near Atlanta and seized ballots and voter records at the urging of a lawyer who had worked with President Donald Trump to try to overturn the results of the 2020 election, a newly released court record revealed Tuesday. FBI special agent Hugh Raymond Evans wrote in an affidavit that the investigation “originated from a referral sent by Kurt Olsen, Presidentially appointed Director of Election Security and Integrity.” Olsen, who took part in the “Stop the Steal” campaign more than five years ago and promoted baseless claims of widespread voter fraud, was previously sanctioned by a federal judge for making “false, misleading and unsupported factual assertions.” He was hired last year by the administration to investigate the 2020 election. Read Article

Michigan governor’s budget proposal includes $43 million for new voting machines | Hayley Harding/Votebeat

Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s proposed 2027-2028 budget includes more than $43 million for new voting equipment, an appropriation election officials across Michigan say is critical in keeping the state’s election infrastructure secure and up to date. The money is only a tiny portion of the $88.1 billion proposal Whitmer unveiled Wednesday. If approved, it will allow clerks to upgrade their machinery to the newest federal standards without forcing cities and townships to shoulder all the costs on their own. If that money doesn’t win approval from the Legislature, however, it could put a major crunch on local clerks who have already seen their elections budgets double or even triple in the last decade with recent expansions to voting procedures. Read Article

New York: Amid turmoil at U.S. Attorney’s Office, federal probe of Ulster County Board of Elections ‘still ongoing’ | Paul Kirby/Daily Freeman

A federal unspecified probe into the Ulster County Board of Elections is apparently ongoing despite upheaval in the U.S. Attorney’s Office that is conducting it. Deputy County Executive Amberly Jane Campbell said Thursday that the investigation is “still ongoing (but) we can’t provide any other update right now.” Deputy County Executive James Amenta confirmed last week that in the last month, the U.S. Attorney’s Office Northern District of New York requested documentation from the Ulster County Board of Elections, although Amenta declined to say what documents the federal government requested. On Wednesday, federal judges appointed Donald T. Kinsella as U.S. Attorney for the Northern District, but U.S. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, in a social media post, fired Kinsella. That apparently left John A. Sarcone III in charge even after a federal judge last month concluded he was serving as U.S. attorney unlawfully. Read Article

North Carolina: Governor, Republican lawmakers square off in court over control of elections | Will Doran/WRAL

North Carolina appellate court judges heard arguments Tuesday in a lawsuit that could determine which political party is in charge of setting the rules for and confirming the results of elections in the state. It could also pave the way for a mass reshuffling of executive power in the state. The lawsuit pits North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein against top state lawmakers. Stein, a Democrat, argues that North Carolina Republican lawmakers violated the state constitution in late 2024 when they passed a law taking control of state election administration from the Democratic governor, giving it instead to the incoming Republican state auditor. The shift, implemented last year, came after nearly a decade of previous failed attempts by Republican lawmakers to give themselves power over elections. Read Article

Pennsylvania will pilot internet-connected pollbooks in May primary | Carter Walker/Spotlight PA

The Pennsylvania Department of State is launching a pilot program to try out the use of internet-connected electronic pollbooks, and the devices would be deployed as early as the May primary election.More than half of Pennsylvania counties are already using or have tested out electronic pollbooks, or e-pollbooks. But the state doesn’t currently allow those systems to be connected to the internet, limiting their utility, proponents say, and some county election officials have been petitioning the state to change that.Proponents point out that internet-connected pollbooks could reduce administrative burdens and allow counties to check results more quickly. But some county officials are concerned that connecting them to the internet could compromise election security. Amy Gulli, a spokesperson for the Department of State, said that on Jan. 28, the department informed e-pollbook vendors about how to apply to participate in the pilot program, which is still in the early stages, and “will assess whether internet-connected EPBs allow county election officials to respond to polling place issues faster and more efficiently.” Read Article

Texas: SAVE tool keeps mistakenly flagging voters as noncitizens | Jen Fifield and Zach Despart/The Texas Tribune

When county clerk Brianna Lennon got an email in November saying a newly expanded federal system had flagged 74 people on the county’s voter roll as potential noncitizens, she was taken aback. Lennon, who’d run elections in Boone County, Missouri, for seven years, had heard the tool might not be accurate. The flagged voters’ registration paperwork confirmed Lennon’s suspicions. The form for the second person on the list bore the initials of a member of her staff, who’d helped the man register — at his naturalization ceremony. It later turned out more than half the Boone County voters identified as noncitizens were actually citizens. A similar situation has been playing out in Texas, where county clerks have likewise found numerous examples of misidentified voters across the state. Read Article

Vermont is getting less help from the feds to keep elections secure | Shaun Robinson/VTDigger

Vermont’s secretary of state says it could get more difficult to keep elections secure because of recent federal funding cuts and other policy changes backed by the Trump administration that have limited cybersecurity information-sharing between states. From 2022 to 2024, Vermont received a $1 million grant each year under decades-old federal legislation called the Help America Vote Act. That money helped pay for long overdue upgrades to the software the state uses to run elections and keep voter data safe, according to Sarah Copeland Hanzas, the secretary, among other initiatives. But for 2025, Congress reduced Vermont’s award to $272,000. That left a gap the secretary’s office worries the state won’t be able to fill going forward, if federal support continues to waver. “It appears that we are on our own for now,” Copeland Hanzas, who’s a Democrat, told Vermont’s House Appropriations Committee last week. Read Article

Wisconsin: Lawsuit against Madison over uncounted ballots will move forward | Sarah Lehr/WPR

A Dane County judge is allowing a lawsuit to move forward against the City of Madison over uncounted ballots. On Monday, Judge David Conway rejected motions from the city and from former Madison Clerk Maribeth Witzhel-Behl that sought to have the case dismissed. The progressive law firm Law Forward launched the lawsuit on behalf of 193 Madison voters whose absentee ballots went uncounted in November 2024. Those untallied votes would not have changed the outcome of any race or referendum. But Law Forward argues that Madison violated the constitutional rights of those nearly 200 voters. Read Article

Wyoming Lawmakers Advance Hand-Count Recount Bill Despite County Clerks’ Objections | David Madison/Cowboy State Daily

House Bill 52 cleared the House Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Committee on Wednesday with broad support, overhauling Wyoming’s recount process to allow hand counting of ballots in close races. The county clerks who would have to carry it out, however, say the bill is a recipe for failure. The measure, a product of the Joint Corporations Committee’s 2025 interim work, redefines a “recount” in Wyoming law. Currently, the statute defines a recount as “the processing of ballots through the tabulation system for an additional time or times” — essentially running ballots back through the same machine. HB 52 changes that definition to include “the counting of ballots by hand.” Read Article

National: Trump doubles down on taking over elections, as outrage builds | Matt Cohen/Democracy Docket

Congress members, state election chiefs, and voting rights advocates are decrying President Donald Trump’s insistence that the federal government wrest control of elections from the states. “Any calls to ‘nationalize’ our elections are a power grab by the Trump Administration,” Rebekah Caruthers, the president and CEO of Fair Elections Center, told Democracy Docket. “Our Constitution says that Congress and the states set the rules for our elections, and the hardworking election officials in thousands of jurisdictions all over the country run them—not the president.”  Mark Lindeman, policy and strategy director at Verified Voting, echoed that view. “As president, Trump has spoken and acted as if he has unlimited power, including unlimited power to interfere in elections,” Lindeman told Democracy Docket. “Americans should expect him to cross Constitutional lines, and we should be ready to push back.” Read Article

National: Steve Bannon calls for Trump to deploy ICE and military troops to polling sites – Jacob Wendler/Politico

MAGA commentator Steve Bannon voiced support for Donald Trump’s push to nationalize elections, calling on the president to deploy ICE officials and military troops to polling sites. Trump said in a Monday podcast interview that “the Republicans ought to nationalize the voting,” despite the fact that the Constitution grants states explicit jurisdiction over election administration. His call sparked outrage from Democrats and largely fell on deaf ears in the GOP — but Bannon, a conservative firebrand who has been a prominent voice in election conspiracy theories, was forceful in his support for the idea. The former White House strategist called for the Trump administration to send Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers to polling sites to prevent noncitizens from voting, citing a debunked conspiracy theory about widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election. Read Article