The Dictatorship
How Trump’s election executive order would break mail-in voting
Donald Trump’s disdain for mail-in voting has been a thorn in the GOP’s side for years. Since its use surged ahead of the 2020 election, he’s occasionally hedged before returning to the notion that the extremely secure balloting method is a gateway to fraud. In an executive order signed Tuesdayhe aims to kneecap mail-in balloting around the country and make the practice as ripe for abuse as he’s claimed.
The mail-in balloting provisions in Trump’s order hinge on a fringe interpretation of a decades-old federal law establishing a uniform Election Day around the country. There are more than a dozen states that currently count ballots postmarked on or before Election Day, as long as they were received within a certain number of days. Under the reading the White House is promoting, states that count ballots received after Election Day violate the federal law, no matter when those ballots are postmarked. And under Article VI of the Constitution, federal law trumps state laws.
He aims to kneecap mail-in balloting around the country and make the practice as ripe for abuse as he’s claimed.
Those states and voting rights advocates will argue that those ballots have been cast by the deadline, just haven’t been received to be counted. But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled otherwise last year in a case brought by the Mississippi Republican Party and the National Republican Committee. That decision didn’t go into effect before last year’s election and is limited to federal elections, not state and local races. It has also yet to be affirmed by any other court, but the Trump administration is clearly hoping to take it nationwide.
Trump’s order tasks Attorney General Pam Bondi with taking “all necessary action” to enforce the Election Day law against states that count late ballots in the tally for presidential electors and members of Congress. It also orders the Election Assistance Commission to condition the funding it provides states to help run their elections on those states no longer counting ballots received after Election Day. (There is a specific carveout in the latter provision for ballots received from “absent uniformed services voters and overseas voters.”)
The order completely subverts the principle behind setting a unitary Election Day — ensuring as many people can vote as possible — in the name of defending it.
The problems are obvious when you consider what’s really being asked of states. States that conduct their elections almost entirely via mail, such as Washington and Oregon, would have to move their current deadlines, which now allow ballots to be mailed up to Election Day. Otherwise, they would be forced to reject ballots that they consider legal. Last year, Oregon counted just more than 13,000 of those ballots appropriately postmarked and received within the seven-day window allowed under state law.
The order would also require states to rely solely on the U.S. Postal Service in returning mailed ballots. USPS’ timeliness was already a concern in 2020 when recently retired Postmaster General Louis DeJoy was at the helm. The fear then was that DeJoy would in some way stymie the delivery of blank ballots to voters or their return to election officials. Those fears never materialized, but with Trump eyeing privatizing the Post Office or merging it under the Commerce Departmentit’s worth considering how an outright politicization of the mail force could affect election results.
There will most certainly be lawsuits against the order, especially some of its even more intrusive provisions that place burdens on states that Trump has no power to order. On one level, I agree with election expert Rick Hasenwho argued Wednesday that the executive order is a “dangerous power grab” that state officials from both parties should reject. There is a fundamental tension between the attempt to usurp power over elections from the states and the GOP’s professed support for “states’ rights.”
There is no tension, though, between Trump’s order and previous conservative efforts to limit the number of people who can easily vote. The order acts as a back door to enact harmful proof of citizenship requirements that will likely face a Democratic filibuster if pushed through Congress. It also actively seeks to punish states who refuse to comply with a demand for “information-sharing agreements” with the Justice Department to root out alleged voter fraud (a perennial unfounded GOP concern), which are more likely to be those states with Democratic leaders.
When you couple in the Justice Department’s hesitancy to back Voting Rights Act casesthis order will potentially disenfranchise millions of voters from casting their ballots safely. Even outside the worst-case scenario, one in which a Trump-controlled Postal Service withholds ballots in blue states until after the deadline has passed, the pieces are all in place for Trump to totally break mail-in voting. In doing so, the order completely subverts the principle behind setting a unitary Election Day — ensuring as many people can vote as possible — in the name of defending it.
Hayes Brown is a writer and editor for BLN Daily, where he helps frame the news of the day for readers. He was previously at BuzzFeed News and holds a degree in international relations from Michigan State University.
The Dictatorship
Federal court rules against new global tariffs Trump imposed
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal court ruled Thursday against the new global tariffs that President Donald Trump imposed after a stinging loss at the Supreme Court.
A split three-judge panel of the Court of International Trade in New York found the 10% global tariffs were illegal after small businesses sued.
The court ruled 2-1 that Trump overstepped the tariff power that Congress had allowed the president under the law. The tariffs are “invalid″ and “unauthorized by law,” the majority wrote.
The third judge on the panel found the law allows the president more leeway on tariffs.
If the administration appeals Thursday’s decision, as expected, it would first turn to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, based in Washington, and then, potentially, the Supreme Court.
At issue are temporary 10% worldwide tariffs the Trump administration imposed after the Supreme Court in February struck down even broader double-digit tariffs the president had imposed last year on almost every country on Earth. The new tariffs, invoked under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, were set to expire July 24.
The court’s decision directly blocked the collection of tariffs from three plaintiffs — the state of Washington and two businesses, spice company Burlap & Barrel and toy company Basic Fun! “It’s not clear’’ whether other businesses would have to continue to pay the tariffs, said Jeffrey Schwab, director of litigation at the libertarian Liberty Justice Center, which represented the two companies.
“We fought back today and we won, and we’re extremely excited,” Jay Foreman, CEO of Basic Fun!, told reporters Thursday.
The ruling marked another legal setback for the Trump administration, which has attempted to shield the U.S. economy behind a wall of import taxes. Last year, Trump invoked the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to declare the nation’s longstanding trade deficit a national emergency, justifying sweeping global tariffs.
The Supreme Court ruled Feb. 28 that IEEPA did not authorize the tariffs. The U.S. Constitution gives Congress the power to establish taxes, including tariffs, though lawmakers can delegate tariff power to the president.
Dave Townsend, a trade lawyer at Dorsey & Whitney, said the ruling will open the door for more companies to request that the tariffs be thrown out and that any payments they’ve made be refunded.
“Other importers likely will now ask for a broader remedy that applies to more companies,” Townsend said, though he cautioned the case could also reach the Supreme Court.
Trump is already taking steps to replace the tariffs that were struck down by the Supreme Court in January. The administration is conducting two investigations that could end in more tariffs.
The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative is looking into whether 16 U.S. trading partners — including China, the European Union and Japan — are overproducing goods, driving down prices and putting U.S. manufacturers at a disadvantage. It is also investigating whether 60 economies — from Nigeria to Norway and accounting for 99% of U.S. imports — do enough to prohibit the trade in products created by forced labor.
The Dictatorship
Trump says EU has until July 4 to approve trade deal
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said in a Thursday social media post that goods from the European Union would face higher tariff rates if the 27-member bloc fails to approve last year’s trade framework by July 4.
The announcement appeared to be a deadline extension after the president said last Friday that EU autos would face a higher 25% tariff starting this week. Trump made the updated announcement after what he described as a “great call” with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Still, the U.S. president was displeased that the European Parliament had yet to finalize the trade arrangement reached last year, which was further complicated in February by the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that Trump lacked the legal authority to declare an economic emergency to impose the initial tariffs used to pressure the EU into talks.
“A promise was made that the EU would deliver their side of the Deal and, as per Agreement, cut their Tariffs to ZERO!” Trump posted. “I agreed to give her until our Country’s 250th Birthday or, unfortunately, their Tariffs would immediately jump to much higher levels.”
It was unclear from the post whether Trump was implying that the tariff rates would jump on all EU goods or the increase would only apply to autos.
His latest statement indicates he might be backing away from his earlier threat on EU autos by giving the European Parliament several more weeks to approve the agreement.
Under the original terms of the framework, the U.S. would charge a 15% tax on most goods imported from the EU.
But since the Supreme Court ruling, the administration has levied a 10% tariff while investigating trade imbalances and national security issues, aiming to put in new tariffs to make up for lost revenues.
The Dictatorship
In the wake of the Virginia ruling, where does the national redistricting arms race stand?
In Virginia, a majority of the House of Delegates voted to approve a new congressional district map that was designed to help Democrats add as many as four seats in the U.S. House. A majority of the state Senate agreed, as did the commonwealth’s popularly elected governor. The issue then went to the people of Virginia, and a majority of voters backed the redistricting initiative, too.
A majority of the Virginia Supreme Court, however, rejected the plan anyway. MS NOW reported:
The Virginia Supreme Court on Friday struck down a voter-approved congressional redistricting plan, ruling that Democrats violated constitutional procedures when placing the referendum on the ballot for last month’s special election. […]
In its 4-3 decision, the court on Friday found that the process used to place the amendment on the ballot did not comply with Virginia’s constitutional rules governing how such proposals must be approved by the legislature before being presented to voters. As a result, the justices upheld a lower court ruling that blocks the amendment from being certified and implemented.
For Democratic efforts on the national level, the ruling is an unexpected gut punch, especially given the fact that after Virginia voters approved the overhauled map last month, it appeared that Democrats would be able to keep pace with the GOP as part of the broader redistricting fight.
What’s more, the state Supreme Court ruling comes on the heels of a similarly brutal blow after Republican-appointed U.S. Supreme Court justices gutted the Voting Rights Act, which opened the door even further to an intensified Republican effort to erase majority-Black congressional districts in the South.
Given all of this, it’s easy to imagine many Americans responding to the head-spinning developments with a simple question: “So where do things stand now?”
Before we dig in on that, it’s worth pausing to acknowledge the absurdity of the circumstances. For generations, states redrew congressional district lines after the decennial census. There were limited exceptions, but in nearly all of those instances, mid-decade redistricting only happened when courts told states that their maps were unlawful and needed to be redone.
The idea that politicians would simply choose to start redrawing maps, in the middle of a decade, in pursuit of partisan advantages, was practically unheard of.
Last year, however, Donald Trump, fearing the results of the 2026 midterm elections and the possible accountability that would result from Democratic victories, decided that the American model needed to be discarded. It was time, the president said, to pursue what one White House official described as a campaign of “maximum warfare” in which Republican officials in key states would embrace gerrymandering without regard for fairness, norms, traditions or propriety.
The goal was simple: Deliver Republican victories in congressional races long before Americans had a chance to cast their ballots.
The result was an arms race that’s still going on — and here’s where things stand.

Texas: Republicans in the Lone Star State got the ball rolling last summer, acting at Trump’s behest and approving a map designed to give Republicans five additional U.S. House seats. It touched off the national arms race.
California: Responding to Texas, Democratic officials in the Golden State, as well as the state’s voters, approved a map of their own designed to give Democrats five additional U.S. House seats.
Missouri: In September, state Republicans approved a map designed to give the GOP one additional seat.
North Carolina: In October, state Republicans approved a map designed to give Republicans one additional seat.
Ohio: While the redistricting effort in the Buckeye State wasn’t as brazen as it was elsewhere, Ohio’s new map diluted two Democratic-held districts, creating GOP pickup opportunities.
Utah: A state court approved a new map that will likely give Democrats one additional seat.
Florida: Just this week, Republicans completed the process on a new map designed to give Republicans as many as four additional seats.
Tennessee: Also this week, Republicans approved a new map designed to give Republicans one additional seat, taking advantage of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling.
Louisiana: While the newly redrawn map in the Pelican State hasn’t been formally unveiled, it will reportedly add one additional Republican seat.
Alabama: Republicans are currently moving forward with plans for a map that would give Republicans two more seats.
It’s important to emphasize that some of these maps are currently facing legal challenges, while others are still taking shape. Most of these maps would take effect during this year’s election cycle, but there’s still some uncertainty surrounding the implementation date in some states.
Nevertheless, the Virginia map that enjoyed popular public support was prepared to help mitigate an unprecedented Republican abuse. The state Supreme Court in the commonwealth appears to have removed that option.
After Virginia voters had their say, many GOP officials questioned whether the entire gerrymandering gambit had been a waste of time and effort. In the aftermath of two highly controversial court rulings, Republicans are suddenly feeling a lot better about the whole scheme.
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