A shocking and historic legal battle is unfolding as advocacy groups, former judges and veteran Justice Department lawyers on both sides of the political aisle mobilize against President Donald Trump’s efforts to reshape the nation’s elections.
The Guardian reported Monday that voting advocates warn of a secret danger as Trump rushes through major federal changes to disrupt the 2026 midterms.
One federal judge in Massachusetts found that implementing Trump’s order could threaten to disenfranchise millions of Americans who vote by mail. She also said the administration had offered no evidence of widespread mail-voting fraud to justify the rushed policy.
An unexpected source of resistance is the coalition itself. Former conservative and liberal judges, Democratic attorneys general, civil-rights lawyers and former Justice Department officials are banding together in an unprecedented alliance. Democracy Defenders Fund leaders told The Guardian that bipartisan credibility is essential as they challenge what they describe as unconstitutional efforts to seize voting data, impose federal election rules and intimidate election officials.
One of those is J. Michael Luttig, a former federal judge and “conservative stalwart,” as the report described.
Speaking to the “Legal AF” podcast, Luttig said that the courts have been the branch that stepped up to provide a check on Trump’s power.
“So today, the only people who can save America are the lower federal court judges of the United States, and they are determined to do so simply by honoring their oath in every one of these cases,” he said.
Luttig added, “It is only the Supreme Court of the United States that is standing in the way of the American people saving their country.”
Though the three branches of government were designed to be a “check and balance” on each other, it has been those courts, not Congress, that have become the barrier to the administration’s attempt to hack the election. The legal veterans say they are prepared to use every available constitutional tool to protect voting rights, and they’re optimistic.
Trump’s executive order isn’t merely illegal; its very logic is challenged in the court filings.
An election expert quoted in a court declaration explained that if 60 seconds is spent on verifying each piece of mail, “it would take about 4.9 years of continuous scanning to verify the whole mailing. If it only took a second to scan each mailpiece, it would take like 30 days. Even if it took only one tenth of a second to scan each mailpiece, it would take a little over 72 hours.”
In Los Angeles County, California, every mail-in ballot has to be checked for signature matches. Trump spent days complaining that the longer things took, the more likely it was “BIG cheating.”
The legal experts highlight the confusion the ordeal would cause if the entire system were changed weeks before an election. North Carolina, for example, has already begun sending out mail ballots.
Washington Attorney General Nick Brown (D) cited the recent ruling: “As the court said, states’ compliance with this illegal order would be ‘practically impossible’ before the November elections given the unprecedented demands it would put on state and local elections officials. The chaos that would cause is exactly what Trump wants. That’s why we continue to fight for a fair and properly administered election.”
Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon and Laramie County Clerk Debra Lee, who are both Republicans, were incensed when the Justice Department sent officials to watch their primary elections, recalled veteran reporter Kerry Drake in an op-ed for WyoFile last week.
“If Department of Justice attorneys blatantly march into the reddest, most pro-Trump state in the nation and demand to interview voters and inspect voting machines in violation of Wyoming’s state election laws, what do you think will happen in both red and blue states during the Nov. 3 midterm elections?” Drake asked.
Gordon went viral at the time, comparing the hijinks to states being forced to fight off federal government overreach.
“I feel very strongly about federal government coming in and taking our guns. I don’t like that. And I don’t like federal government coming in and taking our votes either,” the governor said.
Still, the administration is going to the Supreme Court to get a sign-off.
Anna Baldwin, director of voting rights litigation at the Campaign Legal Center, doesn’t believe it will be successful.
She told The Guardian, “The DOJ’s slapdash effort at getting the Supreme Court’s blessing to turn the USPS into a gatekeeper for mail would be a farce if it didn’t put our fundamental right to vote in the crosshairs. Given the importance of what is at stake, the DOJ’s continued efforts are nothing more than an attempt to foist chaos on the electoral process. But they will fail.”