Mail-In Voting, Executive Orders, and the Fight for Trust in Elections
Topic: Election Integrity & Audit The Vote
⁉️Do You Believe in Coincidences?
We’d like to think that yesterday’s announcement from President Trump to sign an executive order banning mail-in voting and the use of electronic voting machines ahead of the 2026 midterms was no accident in terms of timing.
What are the odds that on the 4 year anniversary of Audit The Vote PA having dinner with President Trump to specifically discuss election integrity, or the lack thereof in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania during the 2020 election, that he would not only be in the position as the current President in 2025, but also announce his plans for a sweeping executive order that will undoubtedly save the mid-term elections if it’s able to hold up in court?
A pretty remarkable coicidence… if you believe in that sort of thing. 😏
Let’s unpack what happened yesterday.
1. What President Trump Announced
On August 18, 2025, President Trump announced his intent to sign an executive order banning mail-in voting and the use of electronic voting machines ahead of the 2026 midterms. Instead, he wants elections run on secure paper ballots with advanced watermarks.
Cue the outrage. Critics cried “dictator!” while supporters said, “finally.” Trump himself said mail-in ballots are corrupt and machines are expensive and unreliable. And honestly, if you’ve ever tried to use one of those touchscreen voting machines, you know half the time it feels like you’re playing a rigged game of Whac-A-Mole.
2. Audit The Vote PA’s Perspective
At Audit The Vote PA, we’ve seen firsthand what happens when the system looks more like a magic trick than a transparent process.
Mail-in ballots? Great if you like ballots floating around the postal system like lost Amazon packages. Not so great if you want actual chain of custody.
Voting machines? They’re basically Vegas slot machines without the fun lights. You press a button, the screen flashes, and you just have to trust that your “jackpot” is being counted somewhere in the black box.
Hand-counted paper ballots? Not fancy, not high-tech—but 100% visible, auditable, and accountable. No software patches, no disappearing USB drives, no excuses.
So when Trump says “no more mail-in ballots, no more machines,” we can’t help but say: welcome to the club, Mr. President.
3. The Constitutional Question
Yes, states run elections. Yes, this executive order will get tied up in court faster than you can say “hanging chads.” But sometimes you have to take the fight to the highest level just to force the debate.
The real question isn’t “does the president have the authority?” It’s “why are we still pretending that convenience matters more than confidence?”
4. Why This Debate Matters
Here’s the problem no one wants to say out loud: Americans don’t trust elections anymore.
We can either keep duct-taping “confidence theater” onto a broken system—cue the press releases about “safest election ever”—or we can admit that voters want to see the process with their own eyes. Transparency isn’t partisan. It’s common sense.
5. How This Affects Pennsylvania
In Pennsylvania, Trump’s executive order would strike at the very heart of the debate that has consumed our state since 2020. Mail-in voting was expanded under Act 77, and it became the flashpoint for lawsuits, ballot challenges, and widespread distrust in the outcome.
Counties struggled with inconsistent signature verification, unsecured drop boxes, and ballot curing policies that changed mid-stream. Machines, meanwhile, remain expensive contracts that few commissioners even understand but rubber-stamp anyway.
If this order takes effect, Pennsylvania would be forced back to the basics: hand-marked, hand-counted ballots at the precinct level. For citizens here who have watched commissioners dismiss concerns and courts dodge accountability, this could finally restore the kind of transparency and trust that’s been missing for years.
6. The Bigger Picture
Politicians have been gaming the system since Eldridge Gerry drew his first salamander-shaped district in 1812. (Seriously, the guy’s legacy is a bad cartoon.)
Gerrymandering, mail-in ballots, voting machines—different tools, same problem: human nature. Or as the Bible puts it, sin and the lust for power.
Which means no executive order, no law, no patch of software is going to cure the problem completely. But hand-marked, hand-counted ballots at least make it a lot harder to cheat behind the curtain.
Final Thought
Trump’s order is bold. Will it survive the courts? Who knows. But the point is bigger than the paperwork: Do we want elections that are quick and convenient—or elections that are believable?
If it takes a little longer to count, fine. We wait in line for iPhones, football tickets, and Starbucks pumpkin spice lattes without blinking. Surely we can wait a few extra hours—or even days—for something a little more important: our Republic.
📬 If you think election integrity is worth more than convenience, subscribe and join us at Audit The Vote PA. Because the Republic doesn’t keep itself—it takes citizens willing to watch, count, and hold leaders accountable.