Despite the Supreme Court’s Ruling, Trump’s Still Trying to Tip the Midterms

The Slatest Trump’s Effort to Help Republicans Win the Midterms Isn’t Over The Supreme Court foiled one of Trump’s most obvious efforts to meddle in congressional elections. But there are many others. Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images. This story is adapted from the Slatest newsletter. You can sign up here to get it in your inbox every day. On Monday, the Supreme Court blocked Donald Trump’s effort to throw mail balloting into chaos ahead of the November midterm elections. But that was just one prong of Trump’s attempts to tilt races toward Republicans. Today we’ll explain the others. This Supreme Court ruling seems like a big deal. What exactly happened? You aren’t wrong. As the legal expert Richard Hasen explains in Slate, Trump’s executive order would have created onerous new requirements for mail-in voting that risked disenfranchising millions of elderly, military, and other voters. Seven of nine justices apparently saw that potential catastrophe coming and rejected it, prompting a Tuesday morning tantrum from the president. Trump has repeatedly tried to get the court to take his side on mail-in ballots, but this ruling looks like the end of the line—at least for this year’s elections. OK, bullet dodged. But what else is Trump doing that we should worry about? Trump’s order was backed by his unfounded claims that mail voting is fraudulent, part of his broader obsession with the false notion that Democrats are “cheating” to win elections. Trump has said he wants to “take over” elections, which are currently administered by state-level officials. That decentralized system is actually a bulwark against the kind of cheating Trump claims to care about—and against a sore-loser president trying to change election rules to protect his own interests. Still, Trump’s administration is trying to get states to hand over voter data and hunting through the rolls for alleged fraud. What have they found? It’s true that individuals have sometimes illegally cast ballots. But many of those cases have been accidents, like when a software error in New Jersey improperly registered noncitizens in 2023 and 2024, and widespread fraud is a myth. Per the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that helped write Project 2025, there have been about 100 cases of noncitizen voting over the past 25 years. Nevertheless, the administration has asked almost every state to turn over databases that include voters’ personal information. Most have resisted, sparking court battles that the administration has overwhelmingly lost. The Department of Homeland Security, meanwhile, has assigned hundreds of employees to parse public voting databases for noncitizens. Some have allegedly posed as voters, potentially violating state privacy laws. Yet Secretary Markwayne Mullin has publicly touted unverified numbers of alleged noncitizen voters and threatened election officials with prison time. But surely those efforts can be contested in court? Democrats and voting-rights groups have already sued over some of Trump’s moves (hence the case rejecting his mail ballot order). But some fear the administration is looking for ways to circumvent courts. Late last month, a whistleblower alleged that the U.S. Postal Service had continued to build an online portal that could’ve thrown out mail ballots en masse despite an order blocking work on it. (The Postal Service claims it hasn’t defied any court orders.) What’s the bigger picture? Courts can’t stop Trump from sowing doubt about the soundness of American elections. He has ordered investigations into debunked voting irregularities in states he lost in 2020 and continues to attack voting machines despite there being no evidence that they’ve ever changed election results. That could lay the groundwork to claim there was fraud if certain races don’t go Republicans’ way this fall. And even if judges toss those claims, they may still depress faith in the results. One recent survey found that fewer than half of Americans expect the midterms to be free and fair, with most Republicans doubting that mailed ballots are counted accurately and most Democrats fearful that Trump will deploy immigration agents to polling places. So while the voting could ultimately go off without a hitch, the crisis of confidence continues. Tolga Akdoğan The midterms are still several weeks away, so let’s turn to a more urgent question: How to enjoy the rest of your evening. My colleagues have some ideas that don’t require an appeal to the Supreme Court. Take a sip: Martinis are savored for their elegant simplicity and refined romanticism. Now, their iconic imagery has been repurposed as chintzy merch and wine mom–style decor. Courtney Iseman asks, “When did we as a society collectively decide, We martini, therefore we are?” Reconsider your “smart” home: Cameras are becoming more and more common in home appliances, including in smart ovens, refrigerators, doorbells, and toothbrushes—even as people decry surveillance measures in public. What does this trend mean for our consumption? Steffi Cao has a prediction. Give your brain a workout: What’s an 11-letter “Enya hit with the repeated lyric ‘Sail away, sail away, sail away’ ”? What’s a nine-letter “cutesy term for spooky snakes”? Sharpen your wordplay skills with today’s crossword. Celebrate with Slate: In honor of our 30th birthday, Slate has revived our original 1996 homepage and filled it with some of our favorite stories. Revisit articles by Slate alums Daniel Engber, David Plotz, Emily Yoffe, and more. We’ll be updating this page over the next month, so keep an eye out for more pieces from the vault! Slate was one of the first news outlets I read regularly, so I’m really enjoying the birthday throwback. Happy trails back to 1996, and hope you have a great night!