President Trump is trying to steal the 2026 midterm elections in real time, experts say. But his opponents have the power to stop him.
In a recent report for Vox, Eric Levitz broke down the various methods that Trump may use to rig the results in his favor. These include ordering the military to seize voting machines and ballots in key districts before they have been counted, then altering the results so that the House Republicans can reject enough Democrats on the grounds of their “qualifications” to retain control of that chamber.
Levitz also pointed to Trump’s recent baseless raid on Fulton County, Georgia voting machines, with Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard present, as proof that Trump is considering doing this while claiming to protect national security. Finally Levitz observed that Trump has talked about stationing ICE at polling stations, which could chill voter turnout.
"For anybody who doubted that this administration is laying the foundation to interfere in elections, the deluge of activity over the last two weeks should lay those doubts to rest,” Wendy Weiser, Vice President of Democracy at the Brennan Center for Justice, told Vox. Weiser’s perspective was echoed by Derek Clinger, Senior Counsel at the State Democracy Research Initiative, University of Wisconsin Law School.
"The nightmare scenario used to be that Trump would invoke the Insurrection Act and have the military seize ballots and machines from a swing state on election night,” Clinger said. “But Fulton County suggests a much more plausible scenario: one where the seizure of ballots is conducted with the appearance of a legal process. I think that approach is both more likely to happen and also harder to challenge in real time."
Yet Levitz argues that Trump’s attempts could fail. Although Justin Levitt, a former Justice Department Official and professor at Loyola Law School, told Vox he believes Trump will do things like misuse ICE to deter people from voting, he does not think Trump’s attempts to directly meddle with voting will be upheld by courts.
"I think every magistrate judge in the country would understand the difference between a search warrant to seize materials for an election that happened five years ago and a search warrant to seize election materials from an election in progress,” Levitt told Vox. Referring to the courts upholding Trump’s Fulton County raid, Levitt said that “I understand why people are worried. But it's not remotely the same."
Levitz further added that any military seizure order would face judicial, political and potentially military resistance, with even some of Trump's own party members rebuking his election takeover remarks. Additionally, ICE does not have enough people to blanket large areas, and their presence at voting stations may inspire heavy turnout rather than intimidate voters into not showing up. Indeed, this is exactly what happened in a Minnesota special election following ICE operations.
As a result of Trump’s recent election meddling efforts, such as assigning an FBI Election Executive, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries warned that “what Donald Trump wants to do is try to nationalize the election. Translation: steal it. And we're not going to let it happen.” Elie Mystal of The Nation condemned people who downplay the threat of Trump stealing the elections, arguing “to ignore the threat posed by Trump, to pretend like everything is going to be okay, to assume that upstanding members of the courts will rise to prevent the theft of the election is to stick your head in the sand.”
He added, “Trump and the Republicans have no intention of letting the upcoming midterms (in which Republicans are predicted to lose control of the House) proceed fairly.”
Although Trump claims the 2020 election was stolen from him, the president has a long history of making baseless claims of theft whenever he loses. When “The Apprentice” was snubbed for Emmys, he accused the process of being rigged. After losing the 2016 GOP Iowa caucuses, he claimed Texas Senator Ted Cruz had stolen them. Before the 2016 presidential election against Hillary Clinton, he declared he'd only accept results "if I win." Then, despite winning in the Electoral College against Clinton, Trump falsely alleged millions voted illegally to explain his vote loss in the popular vote. When he lost in both the Electoral College and popular vote to former President Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election (despite trying to throttle mail-in votes by jamming up the Post Office), he filed dozens of lawsuits — losing 59 cases out of 60 cases that were rejected by over 90 judges, including many of his own appointees. Even Trump's then-Attorney General, William Barr, found no evidence Trump lost through fraud.