Democrats, election officials and voting rights groups I wondered for a long time if President Donald Trumpupon his return to the Oval Office, would again attempt to overturn an election while his party was trailing.
It’s no longer hypothetical.
Late last week, the president ordered his Ministry of Justice has preemptively contest a possible Republican loss in the US Senate race in Alaska. The department calls for a tribunal delay certification of a possible Democratic victory until it is determined whether voters were confused by the presence of two candidates with the same name on the ballot.
Trump followed by calling for charges against Democratic candidate Mary Peltola, a former congresswoman, based on a New York Times report that his campaign helped recruit someone named Dan Sullivan to siphon votes from the Republican incumbent, also named Dan Sullivan. The governor has ordered an investigation.
Scholars say it’s the first time since the civil rights era that the federal government has sued to suspend certification of an election, a duty the Constitution imposes on states.
Trump, for years, has claimed that elections are rigged when he or his party loses, and this time is no exception. He used his midterm rallies to denounce cheating Democrats, criticize election officials by name and call Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system, which could hold the key to control of the Senate, a scam.
But the certification lawsuit elevates Trump’s crusade beyond mere rhetoric, signaling that he is preparing to use the power of the presidency to try to overturn a possible loss. his party is in difficulty to maintain control over Congress Tuesday’s elections.
Earlier this week, the president also announced a $1 million bounty for anyone who provides proof of past or current election fraud in the country. It was unclear whether or how he planned to follow through.
“For at least a year and a half, they’ve been laying the groundwork,” said Theresa Lee, senior attorney for the ACLU. “We’ve been preparing for just as long, if not longer.”
Trump says he will accept results if election is ‘honest’
Trump told reporters this week that he would accept the election results, but with his usual caveat: “If it’s an honest election,” he said.
It follows a pattern. Trump preemptively asserted that the next elections will be rigged and called the election he lost stolen. It started with the Iowa Republican caucuses in 2016, when he came in second to Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.
“Ted Cruz did not win Iowa” Trump said at the time. “He stole it.”
Democrats and other groups opposed to Trump fear his words could turn into directives aimed at forcing his administration to intervene in the midterms. They have been organizing exercises for months and have pre-written trials. They also plan to welcome tens of thousands of people monitor elections on election day.
Early voting has been peaceful so far, with around 35 million people already voting without any notable disruptions.
In that regard, this year’s elections so far resemble the 2025 elections in New Jersey, Virginia and a handful of other states. The Democrats were then preparing for possible action by Trump, but the election took place without major problems. But the Justice Department’s more aggressive actions this month already make 2026 different from any election in recent memory.
He sued California prevent him from counting the ballots after alleging that the state had 20,000 non-citizens on its rolls and making a similar request of Washington concerned about 400 voters in that state. Both states said the requests were too close to the election to satisfy, and a federal judge on Wednesday rejected the California federal government’s requests.
Previously, the Ministry of Justice seized ballots and election records linked to the 2020 presidential election in Fulton County, Georgia, and the administration launched a thorough investigation into that vote, although it I haven’t found any proof yet support trump false allegations of fraud.
Attorney General Todd Blanche said the Justice Department does not want to intervene in the electionsbut had no choice in Alaska.
“We’re not doing anything inappropriate,” Blanche said Sunday on CNN. “But I think it’s important for the American people to understand that we are not trying – (and) President Trump is not trying – to take over any state’s elections in any way shape or form.”
After the lawsuit was filed, Trump told reporters that he the one who pushed for this: “I’m the one who said do it,” the president said.
Prosecutions seem more “impulsive” than strategic
Although the Trump administration claimed to be acting on behalf of Alaska voters in its lawsuit to delay certification, the president’s Republican allies in the state did not appear satisfied.
Senator Sullivan would not say whether he supported the lawsuit. Alaska’s Republican-controlled state government has filed court papers to try to have it thrown out. The state’s other Republican senator, Lisa Murkowski, said the administration “should never have filed it.”
Although controversial, the situation in Alaska is not that unusual. Political parties often support additional candidates on the ballot in an attempt to take votes away from their rivals. If state courts allow it, legal experts say, the federal government has no role in challenging the results.
Derek Muller, a law professor at Notre Dame, wrote that the legal argument in the Alaska trial was “one of the worst I have ever seen.” He said that should reassure the public that Trump will not be able to change the election results.
“The idea that there will be something systemic that will thwart the will of voters seems much more speculative,” he said. “Much of this behavior seems impulsive rather than strategic and planned. »
Courts have repeatedly ruled against the administration, in many cases because the Constitution gives the president no direct power over how elections are conducted. Courts suspended two Trump executive orders looking to change voting procedures. The administration also lost more than two dozen records trying to get detailed voter information from states.
This feels like 2020, when Trump and his allies tried to overthrow his defeat against Democrat Joe Biden and in the process lost dozens of lawsuits.
Can institutions hold up?
Pat McCrory, former Republican governor of North Carolina, is part of Right Count, a group of conservatives who oppose election conspiracy theories and intervention in local elections. He said he was confident the system would hold up.
“The only thing that protects us from anarchy is this thin piece of paper called the Constitution,” McCrory said. “This thin piece of paper is, for me, a cement wall. »
Many analysts expect her to continue blocking Trump in court.
“The courts will likely dismiss most, if not all, of these charges,” said Matt Dallek, a political historian at George Washington University. “But it’s a way to intensify the signal to Trump supporters that the election is rigged.”
The Justice Department declined in 2020 to join Trump allies in litigation. During his second term, Trump expelled from career staff and supplied his administration with people who helped him contest the 2020 election. This has led to growing fears that he could deploy immigration agents, the FBI or even the military to polling places or seize ballots or voting machines, although several administration officialshaving denied they have such plans.
All of this could happen before the courts even have a chance to rule, said Brendan Nyhan, a political scientist at Dartmouth.
“The threat is that he will take irreversible action,” Nyhan said.
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This story has been updated to correct that Matt Dallek is a political historian at George Washington University, not a political scientist at Georgetown University.
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