President Donald Trump issued a sweeping new executive order Tuesday aimed at bolstering the integrity of U.S. elections, with provisions requiring proof of American citizenship to vote, federal coordination with states to verify voter eligibility, withholding federal funds from states that do not comply with federal integrity laws, bolstering the prosecution of election crimes, and other measures.

The EO, entitled “Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections,” states in part, “Free, fair, and honest elections unmarred by fraud, errors, or suspicion are fundamental to maintaining our constitutional Republic. The right of American citizens to have their votes properly counted and tabulated, without illegal dilution, is vital to determining the rightful winner of an election.”

It continues, “Under the Constitution, State governments must safeguard American elections in compliance with Federal laws that protect Americans’ voting rights and guard against dilution by illegal voting, discrimination, fraud, and other forms of malfeasance and error. Yet the United States has not adequately enforced Federal election requirements that, for example, prohibit States from counting ballots received after Election Day or prohibit non-citizens from registering to vote.”

In at least 17 Democrat-controlled cities and municipalities across the nation, laws have passed that allow noncitizens to vote in local elections. (A New York City law allowing noncitizens to vote in local elections was struck down last week.) In addition, as noted previously by The Washington Stand, “a court order prevents officials from asking for proof of citizenship, essentially taking their word on the honor system” for those who attempt to register to vote while obtaining a driver’s license.

Studies have shown that instances of noncitizens illegally voting occur more often than is widely reported. In Virginia, a report found 7,474 illicit votes were cast between 1988 and 2017. Other studies predicted that up to 2.7 million votes may have been cast in the 2024 election.

In an attempt to shore up these issues, Tuesday’s executive order requires proof of U.S. citizenship in order to register to vote on national mail voter registration forms. Documents that would qualify for proof would include a U.S. passport, a REAL ID card, or a military, state, or federal ID card. The EO also directs the commissioner of Social Security to work with states to help verify “the eligibility of individuals registering to vote or who are already registered” using federal databases.

The EO further directs the Election Assistance Commission to “take all appropriate action to cease providing Federal funds to States that do not comply with” verifying proof of citizenship on voter registration forms. It also directs the attorney general and state officials to work with each other to share information about possible election crimes, orders federal officials to assess the security “of all electronic systems used in the voter registration and voting process,” and proscribes that federal funds be withheld from states that count “absentee or mail-in ballots received after Election Day in the final tabulation of votes,” among other directives.

The EO is likely to face legal challenges, with some observers saying the order oversteps the authority of the president. The ACLU vowed to challenge the measure in court on the same day it was issued.

But experts say the EO is simply an attempt by President Trump to enforce election integrity laws that are supported by a supermajority of Americans.

“Ask any voter concerned about the integrity of federal elections and they’ll tell you they’re worried about the potential for noncitizens to vote, messy voter files, state election officials who don’t enforce election laws, mail-in votes included in final tabulations that arrived after election day, and the voting machines themselves,” FRC Action Director Matt Carpenter told TWS. “President Trump’s executive order addresses all these concerns.”

He continued, “There are many improvements to election integrity in this order, but the one that will probably do the most to immediately improve trust in our elections is ensuring proof of citizenship is a requirement on voter registration forms. With millions of illegal immigrants in the country as a direct result of the failures of the Biden-Harris administration to secure the border, protecting the ballots of American citizens from being diluted by the ballots of noncitizens is the most urgent improvement in election integrity that needed to be made — and this executive order does that.”

Ken Blackwell, special advisor for Election Integrity at FRC Action, also expressed optimism that the EO will improve the reliability of U.S. elections.

“I think [the EO] is sweeping,” he remarked during Wednesday’s “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins.” “I think it’s a major overhaul of our election system. And from a security standpoint, I think one of the things in terms of the back story that President Trump said in signing the executive order was that he was going to establish the election system as part of our national security apparatus.”

Blackwell further elaborated that what “Trump is saying [is] when you expand Election Day to election month, you create internal difficulties and challenges in terms of the chain of custody, and so squeezing it back down to as close to a day [as possible] is smart from a security standpoint.”

According to Blackwell, who formerly served as Ohio’s 48th Secretary of State, another “smart move” within Trump’s EO “is to basically say that we’re going to use all of our databases to make sure that only citizens can vote. And so that verification dimension of his executive order is very, very smart. And as someone who’s [served as] a minister in elections, one of the things that I know is that we have databases that can help us to make sure that we stop this runaway notion that we are a nation without borders, and that we allow voters without borders.”

Blackwell concluded by emphasizing that in order to codify Trump’s EO, Congress must enact it as legislation.

“[It] is going to be important that we use this opportunity presented to us where Republicans have the trifecta — they have the presidency, the House, and the Senate,” he observed. “… We have to codify those principles and practices and policies in the executive order to make sure that they’re long lasting and not flimsy and overturned by a change in the White House. And I’m so proud of the job that Speaker [Mike] Johnson [R-La.] is doing. I’m sure that his counterparts in the Senate will understand the brilliant opportunity that we have in front of us.”