National: OpenAI heralds cybersecurity, election interference safeguard plans for 2026 midterms | Tim Sparks/CyberScoop

OpenAI on Wednesday hailed its plans to safeguard information and aid cybersecurity defenders in the 2026 midterm elections, including work to combat deepfakes and other forms of artificial intelligence misuse. The announcement builds on commitments from major tech companies in 2024, including OpenAI, to protect elections from AI-infused election interference — efforts that some thought weren’t enough. Government agencies, non-governmental institutes and others have increasingly warned about AI’s ability to have a negative impact on elections even as they advertise its potential for good. OpenAI’s plan has five planks: spreading reliable information about voting and election results, helping with cybersecurity, watermarking deepfakes, enforcing policies that ban users from deploying its tools for election interference, and weeding out political bias in its models. Read Article

Opinion: Were the Constitution’s Authors a Little Too Optiistic? | Adam Liptak/The New York Times

The men who drafted the Constitution knew they were playing with fire when they created a novel and powerful new office: the president of the United States. “The first man put at the helm will be a good one,” Benjamin Franklin said at the Constitutional Convention in June 1787, referring to George Washington. “No body knows what sort may come afterward. The executive will be always increasing here, as elsewhere, till it ends in a monarchy.” The framers were not blind to the danger that they were creating a new kind of king, and the Constitution they adopted a few months later tried to strike a balance in inventing what was then a wholly novel office. They wanted a president who was decisive, responsive and responsible. But they also sought to establish a constitutional structure able to constrain a president who aspired to be a monarch. Read Article

Opinion: The ‘greatest threat’ to rule of law in decades. That’s how lawyers, judges see Trump | Mark Z. Barabak/Los Angeles Times

Sometimes it seems as though the only thing that stands between a functioning democracy and a full-on Trump autocracy is a thin, black-robed line.Although the Supreme Court, in general, and conservative appellate courts, in particular, have bowed and granted President Trump permission to do pretty much anything he wants, they haven’t thoroughly capitulated to his endless grasping for ever more power. (The way invertebrate congressional Republicans have.)At the lower-court level, judges have repeatedly ruled in ways intended to check Trump, most notably when it comes to violating civil and constitutional rights in pursuit of his indiscriminate immigration dragnet.The tendency to slow-walk his administration’s response to those rulings — and ignore others that Trump thinks he can safely snub — only contribute to the perception of presidential lawlessness and a sense that our judicial system is being strained to something approaching a breaking point.Go ahead, if you’d like, and dismiss those concerns as just so much overwrought hand-wringing, or the mindless anti-Trump blathering of your friendly political columnist. A new survey of legal experts — including federal judges, top-tier lawyers and scores of professors from some of the country’s leading law schools — finds widespread concern about the brittle state of our legal system. Read Article

Arizona: Maricopa County recorder threatens felony charges over ‘unauthorized’ drop boxes ahead of primary election | Sasha Hupka/Votebeat

A messy and longstanding feud between Maricopa County Recorder Justin Heap and the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors over control of the key swing county’s elections has spilled over into a new arena. On Wednesday, Heap sent a letter to the board asserting his office’s authority over ballot drop boxes and warning that election workers who handle ballots deposited in “unauthorized” receptacles could face criminal penalties. The letter, written by Heap’s attorney, arrived hours before county supervisors were set to take up a routine vote on drop box locations for the July 21 primary. It set the stage for a lengthy and fiery meeting that put the divisions between the county’s mostly GOP officials on full display. The spiraling saga is amplifying questions about how effectively top county officials will be able to administer this year’s midterm election. Read Article

California tries to block Trump involvement in election procedures | Laurel Rosenhall/The New York Times

Six days before the California primary, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation on Wednesday intended to safeguard elections after federal officials and local sheriffs took unusual steps in the last year to seize ballots from election offices.The new law, which takes effect immediately, would not stop officials who have a warrant. But Newsom described it as a way “to address the legitimate anxiety” over election security amid attempts by the Trump administration and the president’s allies to tamper with results and sow doubt in the mechanics of democracy.The governor, a Democrat whose popularity has soared as he’s taken a more combative stance against President Donald Trump, listed various actions taken by Trump to explain the need for the bill. Read Article

California’s overseas voters face new barriers after Trump administration cut key program | Sara DiNatale/San Francisco Chronicle

It’s never been easy to cast an absentee ballot from inside a military submarine. But now that the Trump administration has eliminated a crucial mechanism to return absentee ballots, overseas voting requires even more of a herculean effort. It’s an archaic reality: California’s absentee voter laws rely heavily on fax machines and the U.S. Postal Service. For military members in far-flung deployments or at sea, where the Postal Service is unreliable to nonexistent, the Department of Defense’s free email-to-fax service was a lifeline to democracy for the last 36 years. The Department of Defense in August announced, without explanation, it was cutting the fax service as the administration axed federal programs it said constituted wasteful spending. The voters who used the program are now facing their first election cycle without it. “We’re thinking of the military voters who will no longer be able to cast their ballots in time,” said Sen. Sabrina Cervantes, D-Riverside, who is attempting to reform state absentee voting law in the Legislature. “We want to make sure we aren’t abandoning Californians who are deployed abroad or serving overseas.” Read Article

Colorado county clerks from both parties feel abandoned by Governor for letting felon Peters out of jail early | David O. Williams/The Aspen Times

Gov. Jared Polis thinks his decision to commute the prison sentence of 2020 election denier, convicted felon and former Mesa County Clerk and Recorder Tina Peters will someday be viewed in the same light as former Beaver Creek resident and President Gerald Ford’s pardon of President Richard Nixon: An act of national “reconciliation and healing.” For many Democrats and some Republicans in Colorado, that day will never arrive. While his own party calls for the censure or even impeachment of Polis for essentially ending Peters’ nearly nine-year sentence for breaching her own election systems in support of President Donald Trump’s widely debunked 2020 election claims, current and former Colorado clerks from both sides of the aisle say something much larger than the governor’s legacy is at stake. “We are furious, disgusted, and deeply disappointed by the Governor’s decision,” the Colorado County Clerk’s Association (CCCA) wrote in a statement. “At a time when election officials need strong support, this decision abandons them and supports the attack on the legitimacy of American elections.” County clerks from both parties feel abandoned by Polis for letting felon Peters out of jail early | AspenTimes.com

Maryland: Vendor error causes mass redo of mail-in ballots | Racquel Bazos/The Baltimore Sun

The Maryland State Board of Elections is sending new mail-in ballots to every voter who requested one after a vendor error mixed up some voters’ party affiliations, elections officials said Friday. Though it’s possible that not every mail-in ballot was incorrect, according to the State Board, election integrity and security demands resending all the ballots. Only voters who got their mail-in ballots before May 14 might be impacted, the board wrote. “We are diligently working to address this error and provide clear instructions to those affected as quickly as possible,” Jared DeMarinis, state administrator of elections, said in the Friday announcement. “The State and Local Boards of Elections remain committed to running an election that is verified, secure and accurate. Mail-in voting is an integral facet of the electoral process. With over 500,000 voters requesting mail-in ballots, we want to eliminate any doubt in its integrity or accuracy that is why I have arranged the sending of replacement ballots,” he said.. Read Article

Michigan state police investigate Antrim County Clerk’s husband’s access to office, computer | Carter Walker/Votebeat

Antrim County Clerk Victoria Bishop’s husband was alone in a secure area of the clerk’s office and using the clerk’s computer, according to a report by the Michigan State Police, which investigated the incident. According to the police report, a county maintenance worker saw Randy Bishop alone in the clerk’s office on Feb. 19, watching a video stream of a county board of commissioners meeting that Victoria Bishop was attending. Randy Bishop is a conservative talk radio host who goes by “Trucker Randy” and has claimed to have evidence that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. Votebeat obtained the report from a local resident who received it in response to a public records request, and confirmed the report’s authenticity with the state police. The report itself, which is partially redacted, says the case is currently pending review by the Antrim County prosecutor’s office, though that office said its understanding is that the matter was being referred to the state attorney general, whose office did not respond to a request for comment. Read Article

South Dakota: Snowbirds allege poll workers changed them to federal voters without instruction to prove residency | Makenzie Huber/South Dakota Searchlight

A couple who spend winters in Arizona and the rest of the year in South Dakota said they were given a federal-only ballot and denied a state-local ballot when they tried to vote in person last week at the Minnehaha County administration building. Instead of retaining their Hartford home when they retired and started traveling south for the winter, Steve Nolte and Kelly Stewart sold their home four years ago, bought a recreational vehicle, and parked it year-round at a South Dakota lakeside resort. They use a mail-forwarding service in Sioux Falls, and they’re registered to vote in Minnehaha County. Since January, state law requires that anyone who lists only a mail forwarding address or post office box — without describing where they actually live — be registered as a federal-only voter when they register or request an absentee ballot. That means the person can only vote in federal contests such as presidential and congressional races — not other statewide, legislative, county, city or local races or ballot questions. The law was motivated partly by some legislators’ opposition to full-time RVers voting in local and state races. Read Article

Texas: Calm, not chaos, as Dallas County voters cast ballots in runoff with countywide system | Tracey McManus/The Dallas Morning News

Voting unfolded slowly but smoothly in Dallas County’s runoff on Tuesday, a change from the chaos that took place during the March 3 primary election. After the county Republican Party forced a switch to precinct-based voting, thousands of confused voters from both parties, accustomed to the vote-anywhere system, were turned away from polls and redirected to their neighborhood voting sites. Making matters worse, some voters were sent to the wrong polls by incorrect maps on the Secretary of State’s website and others received bad information from navigators stationed at voting sites. It prompted former Republican Party Chair Allen West to amend the GOP’s contract with the county to revert to the countywide system for the runoff, citing a fear of being sued for voter disenfranchisement. Because county officials control early voting in Texas, the Republicans’ push for precincts applied only to the primary and runoff election days. Read Article

Texas using DPS records to confirm citizenship of voters flagged by federal database | Natalia Contreras/The Texas Tribine

The Texas Secretary of State’s Office is now checking whether 2,724 registered voters it flagged as potential noncitizens may have already provided proof of citizenship to the Texas Department of Public Safety, Christina Adkins, elections division director, said during a meeting with county election administrators earlier this month. That check comes after county elections officials found the federal database used to generate the list flagged some voters who had already given citizenship documentation to DPS when they registered to vote. Texas officials in October sent counties the list of potential noncitizens generated by checking the state’s roll of more than 18 million registered voters against a federal database used to verify citizenship. County election officials have since confirmed some of the flagged voters were citizens, though a total number was not immediately available. In addition, they found that hundreds of the flagged voters had registered through DPS, which requires proof of citizenship, such as a passport, and keeps copies of such documents on file. Read Article

Wisconsin: Lawsuit seeks to require election officials to let absentee voters cure their ballots | Alexander Shur/Votebeat

The League of Women Voters of Wisconsin is challenging the state’s law governing voters’ ability to fix missing information on their absentee ballots, alleging that the law violates the Wisconsin Constitution by giving clerks a vast amount of discretion over whether to reject ballots. The group is asking a Dane County judge to require all clerks to provide voters notice when an absentee ballot certificate is lacking necessary information — such as a signature or the address of a voter or the person who witnessed the ballot’s casting — and give them an opportunity to add that information before rejecting the ballot, a process known as “curing” the ballot. Right now, the law tells clerks that they “may” return incomplete absentee ballots to voters. That results in some municipal clerks sending voters prompt notice about faulty ballots, while other clerks put those ballots in the rejected pile without informing the voter at all, the lawsuit states. Municipalities also treat absentee ballots differently depending on when they receive them, the lawsuit alleges, and those that arrive closer to Election Day often have a lesser chance of getting cured. Read Article

National: Trump so far failing in quest for power over elections as midterms approach | Jonathan Shorman/News From The States

AAs President Donald Trump tries to assert power over U.S. elections, he has raged on social media, cajoled Republican lawmakers and unleashed the Department of Justice on his political enemies. What has he accomplished with all that effort? Not a lot. Six months before the November midterm elections, the Trump administration’s quest to exercise authority over the contests and impose sweeping restrictions on voters has proved largely unsuccessful. The aggressive campaign — separate from Trump's more effective foray into redistricting fights — has been stymied by the courts, rebuffed by many state election officials and opposed by key Republican senators. “I think there’s many out there who are worried about the constant drumbeat of what the administration is trying to do and what they might do in the future. I hear this from voters, I hear this from election officials,” said David Becker, executive director of the nonpartisan Center for Election Innovation & Research. “And what I see is that there is a vast chasm between wanting to do something and trying to do something and actually successfully doing it.” Read Article

GOP redistricting confuses voters and burdens election officials | John Hanna and Jack Brook/Associated Press

Thousands of Louisiana voters have already cast early ballots for congressional candidates in what soon could be the wrong districts. Alabama’s primaries are a week away, but the state plans a do-over for voting on U.S. House races. A new congressional map in Tennessee upended races that had been underway for months. Republicans’ rush to gerrymander congressional districts across several Southern states after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling hollowed out the Voting Rights Act is confusing voters and creating logistical headaches for local election officials. The changes are hitting while primary season is in progress. The chaotic upheaval to an election season that could determine which party controls the U.S. House is the latest fallout from an intensely partisan gerrymandering battle initiated by President Donald Trump last year to protect Republicans’ slim majority. Read Article

National: Republicans who denied 2020 election results could be governors next year | Dan Merica, Patrick Marley and Clara Ence Morse/The Washington Post

Political figures who took leading roles in trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election appear on track to win the Republican Party’s nomination for governor in several of the country’s biggest battleground states, including Arizona, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Their prominence shows how President Donald Trump’s baseless claims that the election was stolen have become an article of faith within the Republican Party, more than five years after he lost to Joe Biden. And it means victories in this year’s midterm elections would give Trump supporters who were central to his efforts to overturn the election key oversight roles in the 2028 presidential election, for which states hold main authority. The GOP fields for governor include activists who took vocal, and sometimes official, actions in support of Trump’s efforts to claim victory in 2020, a sheriff who recently seized ballots in California, and members of Congress who voted to reverse the 2020 results and backed a lawsuit seeking to do the same. Read Article

National: Lawyers aim to block Trump order that would create eligible voter list | Michael Kunzelman and Nicholas Riccadi/Associated Press

President Donald Trump exceeded his authority when he issued an executive order to restrict voters’ ability to cast ballots by mail, attorneys for Democrats and civil rights groups told a federal judge on Thursday. U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols didn’t rule from the bench on the plaintiffs’ request for an order blocking officials from implementing Trump’s March 31 order, his second related to elections since winning his second term in the White House. The case is one of multiple lawsuits filed to block the order on the grounds that only states and Congress, and not the president, are given power under the Constitution to decide how elections are run. Trump’s initial executive order to revamp elections by requiring documentary proof of citizenship, issued last year, was largely halted by multiplefederal judges on similar grounds. He issued his latest order only after the voting bill he backed stalled in Congress. The current legal fight comes as the country is in the midst of primary elections and election officials are preparing for the intricacies of holding the fall’s midterm elections. Read Article

National: DOJ releases legal rationale for nationwide voter data collection | Derek B. Johnson/CyberScoop

The Trump administration released a legal opinion outlining the legal rationale behind its nationwide voter data collection efforts, justifying an aggressive federal role in vetting voter eligibility, a position courts have repeatedly rejected in related litigation. The memo, released Tuesday by the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel, concedes that while election administration is “primarily the purview of the states,” the administration’s efforts are a lawful exercise of federal oversight. Multiple federal courts have come to the opposite conclusion, dismissing half a dozen lawsuits from DOJ and the Department of Homeland Security that would force states to comply. Further, states have repeatedly confirmed through recounts, audits, investigations and lawsuits that the number of non-citizens registered to vote (and who end up actually casting ballots) in U.S. elections is infinitesimal. David Becker, executive director of the Center of Election Innovation and Research, noted in a post on BlueSky that “6 courts, including 2 judges appointed by the current president, think this ‘opinion’ isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.” Becker, a former DOJ senior trial attorney in the voting section of the Civil Rights Division, has consistently argued that the executive branch and White House have no legal or constitutional role to play in vetting state voter registration. Read Article

National: Trump thrusts the Postal Service back into his election fraud crusade | Gabe Cohen and Jeremy Herb/CNN

President Donald Trump is dragging the US Postal Service deeper into his war on mail-in voting. After years of baselessly casting vote by mail as a fraud magnet, Trump in March issued an executive order that would push USPS far beyond delivering ballots — and into the business of deciding who gets one. That order has raised alarms inside the Postal Service over whether it can or should take on such a complicated and controversial role, sources told CNN, especially when it may need help from Trump and Republicans to steady its finances. Under the order, the Postal Service would work with states to determine who can vote by mail and enforce that eligibility, flagging or rejecting ballots tied to people not on those lists. Voting-rights groups and some Democratic-led states say that’s an unconstitutional power grab: The Constitution gives states — not the president or USPS — control over election administration. “USPS is no longer merely a carrier of ballots; it is instead transformed into a gatekeeper of voter eligibility,” lawyers challenging the order wrote. Even as the lawsuits move through federal court, the order directs the Postal Service to begin the first stage of implementation — its rulemaking process — by the end of May. The Postal Service says it’s begun that process, but current and former postal officials question whether a cash-strapped USPS could take on a sweeping new election role — or whether its independent board could refuse. Read Article

National: Supreme Court faces new criticism for changing redistricting law close to 2026 elections | Lawrence Hurley/NBC

The Supreme Court has frequently admonished judges not to interfere in election cases when the process is already underway, but it is now being accused of doing exactly that in recent decisions favoring Republicans in redistricting fights. The court’s ruling in a case from Louisiana that weakened the Voting Rights Act has set off a frenzy in some Republican-led states to draw new congressional maps that favor their party. The stakes are high ahead of this year’s midterm elections that will determine which party controls the House. The court released its ruling, centered on Louisiana’s map but with national implications, less than three weeks before that state’s congressional primary and after delaying action on the case for more than a year. Now, Louisiana and Alabama are moving back their primaries to reset their districts, and other states could follow. The court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, further expedited the process by granting special requests filed by Louisiana and Alabama, allowing the states to move forward with new maps that will eliminate majority-Black districts held by Democrats. Read Article

National: The Election Deniers Are Winning – The universe of people pressing debunked theories is so broad that it’s a feature of the system | Yvonne Wingett Sanchez, Shane Harris and Sarah Fitzpatrick/The Atlantic

Clay Parikh, a cybersecurity expert from Alabama, spent years as a bit player in the world of election denial. He wasn’t a star with his own media platform, like the MyPillow guy. But he still gained a modest following by circulating conspiracy theories about President Trump’s 2020 defeat, including that poll workers gave Trump supporters—but not other voters—felt-tip markers to fill out their ballots, rendering them invalid and unreadable by voting machines. More recently, he’s asserted that a group of federal lawmakers is covering up foreign election interference. “They’re all puppets,” he said on the Rumble-streamed Real AF Patriot show in January. “They’re bought and paid for; it’s just by who.” He claimed that because of “undeniable” evidence of malfeasance, justice was coming. On that last point, Parikh may actually be in a position to know. He is now pushing debunked election claims from within the systems he rails against as a special government employee in the Trump administration. The search-warrant affidavit that allowed the FBI to seize election materials in Georgia in January—an extraordinary intervention by federal law enforcement—cited an analysis by Parikh. Last fall, Parikh began a contract with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office that made him a player in the state’s process for certifying election equipment. He boasts of access to the Wyoming secretary of state, who, he said on Rumble, has invited him to participate in an online presentation with residents. And at 1:01 a.m. on Christmas Day, Trump made Parikh internet famous when he reposted a video of the 63-year-old testifying in court that election equipment could be infiltrated remotely. Read Article

Arizona: DOJ argues ruling that blocked voter data request would have undermined civil rights | Jonathan Shorman/Stateline

The U.S. Department of Justice on Wednesday suggested to a federal appeals court that upholding a lower court decision blocking the Trump administration’s access to sensitive voter data would weaken its ability to investigate racial discrimination in voting. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held oral arguments on whether to reverse a district court judge’s opinion that Michigan doesn’t have to provide the Justice Department with its unredacted voter list that contains dates of birth, driver’s license and partial Social Security numbers. At the core of the case is how federal courts should interpret the 1960 Civil Rights Act, which grants the U.S. attorney general broad access to documents and records that “come into the possession” of election officials. Congress passed the law to empower investigations into voting discrimination against Black citizens. A lawyer for the Trump administration on Wednesday sought to discredit the logic behind the district court judge’s decision. He said the decision would have hampered 1960s era investigations into discrimination against Black voters if it had been in place at that time. An assistant Michigan attorney general called that a major misreading of the law. Read Article

Connecticut: Voting by mail to be a universal option | Mark Pazniokas/CT Mirror

A divided Senate gave final passage Wednesday to legislation that lifts the last barriers to no-excuse absentee voting in Connecticut and will make casting ballots by mail a universal option in this year’s primaries and general election. Passage of the bill came on a 25-11 vote on the last day of the General Assembly’s annual session, a day of pomp, circumstance and exhaustion. The Senate worked overnight until 8 a.m. then returned Wednesday afternoon. Once signed by Gov. Ned Lamont, the measure, House Bill 5001, will repeal a law that denies absentee ballots to any voter who cannot attest to being unable to vote in person due to sickness, disability, absence, military service, religious conflicts or being an elections worker. Read Article

Georgia Governor calls June special session over redistricting, ballot QR codes | Maya Homan and Alander Rocha/Georgia Recorder

Georgia lawmakers will reconvene in June for a special session to redraw the state’s political maps, Gov. Brian Kemp announced Wednesday. The move comes in the wake of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision that weakened key protections under the Voting Rights Act. Lawmakers will also be tasked with addressing an upcoming deadline to change the state’s current election system, which relies on a ballot QR code to count votes. Under a state law passed in 2024, QR codes cannot be used for the official ballot count after July 1. Kemp broke with many other Republican-led states in the South when he announced that the state would not pursue redistricting ahead of the 2026 general election. Other states, like Alabama and Tennessee, have rushed to break up Black-majority districts since the ruling. Read Article

Michigan: Department of Justice demands voter registration lists at appeals court | Kevin Koeninger/Courthouse News Service

State election officials must provide unredacted, electronic versions of voter registration lists to the federal government to comply with the Civil Rights Act and maintain election integrity, the federal government argued Wednesday at the Sixth Circuit. Michigan’s Democratic Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson found herself in the crosshairs of the federal government in August 2025 after she refused its request for the state’s unredacted voter registration list. According to officials at the Department of Justice, several “irregularities” — including lower than average voter removal and inadequate voter confirmation numbers — raised concerns Michigan might not be in compliance with the National Voter Registration Act. Benson handed over the public version of the registration list but denied the government an unredacted copy based on her interpretation of both federal laws. Read Article

Montana district court blocks law restricting voter registration hours, allows voter ID law | Micah Drew/Daily Montanan

A Montana district court has ordered a temporary halt on a new law aimed at restricting Election Day voter registration and tightening the hours voters can register in the days leading up to it, while upholding a new voter identification law. In a 22-page order on Friday, District Court Judge Adam Larsen granted a preliminary injunction against Senate Bill 490, a bill sponsored by Sen. Mike Cuffe, R-Eureka. With the ruling, the state’s existing rules stay in place, allowing voters to register to vote on Election Day as long as they are in line by the close of voting hours. “Unions like ours are organized around the fundamental right of every voice to be heard and every vote to count in our workplaces and society,” said Amanda Curtis, president of the Montana Federation of Public Employees, which brought the lawsuit against the state and Secretary of State Christi Jacobsen. “Montanans voted to protect same day voter registration a decade ago, and today MFPE members are proud to have defended this right from overreaching politicians.” Read Article

Pennsylvania won’t test internet-connected electronic pollbooks in 2026 primary | Carter Walker/Votebeat

The Pennsylvania Department of State is postponing a pilot program to connect electronic pollbooks — the devices election workers use to check voters in at the polls — to the internet. Counties were slated to test the function in the May 19 primary, but the department said last week that unresolved technical questions and low interest from counties led them to delay the pilot until at least next year. Only Philadelphia, Lebanon, and Delaware counties had signed up for the pilot, the department confirmed. “While the anticipated pilots are being postponed, the feedback and collaborative discussions have helped identify key technical and operational considerations that will support more informed decision-making in the future as DOS plans a more comprehensive feasibility review of full connectivity after the 2026 General Election,” said Ellen Lyon, a spokesperson for the department. Read Article

South Carolina: ‘Mismanagement’ by state treasurer contributed to cost overruns for voting machines, report finds | Jessica Holdman/SC Daily Gazette

Loan negotiations by the state treasurer’s office contributed to unplanned overages and sky-high financial penalties against the Election Commission for new voting machines, according to a report Thursday by South Carolina’s inspector general. In a statement, Treasurer Curtis Loftis denied that his office was at fault. He laid the blame squarely on the state’s former elections chief, who was fired last September and arrested a month later on charges of embezzlement and misconduct unrelated to the voting machine contract. The nearly year-long investigation found mismanagement in the office of the state’s top banker. Whether it represented misconduct is outside the inspector general’s purview, the report noted. The investigation, requested by a Senate chairman, followed his committee’s inquiry into a $1.8 billion accounting error in the state’s books. Read Article

Texas election officials face growing fatigue as back-to-back elections stretch staff, volunteers | Daisy Escatel and Ella Mitchell/KETK

As early voting begins Monday for Texas’ primary runoff elections, county election offices across the state are preparing for yet another round of voting in what has become an increasingly relentless election calendar. For some Texas counties, the May 27 primary runoff marks the third election since March, with additional runoff elections and potential constitutional amendment elections still ahead later this year. Election administrators say the nonstop cycle is pushing both full-time staff and volunteer poll workers to their limits. Texas voters have already participated in several elections in 2026, beginning with the March primary elections, followed by city, school and special elections in May. In many communities, races that failed to produce a majority winner have triggered runoff elections, requiring county offices to quickly reset and prepare all over again. Read Article

US Virgin Islands: Paper Ballot Bill Held Again After Clash Over Hand-Counting, Machine Trust and Nearly $50K Cost Estimate | Nelcia Charlemagne/The Virgin Islands Consortium

A proposal by Senator Franklin Johnson to allow voters to request hand-counted paper ballots was held in committee for a second time Wednesday, after elections officials maintained their opposition and lawmakers agreed that testifiers needed more time to review a late-delivered amendment. Introducing the measure, Senator Johnson stressed that the bill “does not end machine voting” and does not eliminate use of the DS200 tabulation machine. “This revised amendment says the paper ballot option is an addition to any voting method already allowed by law,” he explained. Under the proposal, a voter who chooses to use a paper ballot could request that it be counted by hand. Those ballots would be stored separately from ballots tabulated by the DS200 machine and would not be scanned. Senator Johnson said the amendment addresses concerns previously raised by Elections Supervisor Caroline Fawkes, including spoiled ballots, chain of custody, reconciliation and other issues. Read Article