PORTLAND, Ore. (KATU) — President Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday aimed at tightening voting rules, setting up a legal fight with states that rely heavily on mail ballots and prompting Oregon and Arizona to sue.
The order calls for the Department of Homeland Security, working with the Social Security Administration, to create lists of eligible voters in each state, according to the text released Tuesday.
It also seeks to bar the U.S. Postal Service from sending absentee ballots to people who are not on each state’s approved list, though voting law experts say the president likely lacks the power to mandate what the Postal Service does. The order also calls for ballots to have secure envelopes with unique barcodes for tracking.
“The cheating on mail-in voting is legendary. It’s horrible what’s going on,” Trump said as he signed the order, repeating false allegations about mail ballots. “I think this will help a lot with elections.”
Oregon Secretary of State Tobias Read, a Democrat, said Oregon plans to challenge the order. “We don’t need decrees from Washington, D.C.,” Read said. “My message to the President: We’ll see you in court.”
In an interview with KATU News on Tuesday, Read called the order “another desperate, illegal power grab that shows a total lack of respect for the American people and our Constitution,” adding, “The Constitution is clear: states run elections. Oregon’s gold standard vote-by-mail elections are secure, fair, and accurate.”
Read said the executive order “is not going to go unchallenged,” and noted that Oregon has already prevailed in court against the Trump administration on election-related issues.
“We’ve already beaten the President twice when he succeeded his authority. When it comes to elections and we’re prepared to do that again,” Read said.
Read said the practical effect of the order would be to allow the federal government “to decide who gets to vote” and to “hold important election integrity and security dollars hostage.”
He called the order “irresponsible,” “reckless,” “expensive” and “unnecessary,” and said, “Oregon is not going to take this lying down.”
Asked about potential impacts with the primary 56 days away, Read said he did not see how county clerks could implement changes in the middle of an election cycle. “We’re in an election cycle already, so this is irresponsible,” he said.
Read also pushed back on Trump’s argument that the order is about election integrity. “There’s no evidence that there is any issue with election integrity,” Read said, adding that Oregon has been “running safe, accurate, fair elections in Oregon by mail for more than 25 years.”
Gov. Tina Kotek also criticized the order, saying, “Trump’s attacks on mail by vote, by mail are not about fraud. They are about silencing people. Oregon won’t back down from defending the system we trust to make our voices heard.”
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden responded in a social media post: “Oregonians have successfully voted by mail for over thirty years, and we’ll be damned if we let Donald Trump change the way our state runs its elections. My message to the White House is this: if you come for Oregon’s vote-by-mail, you’ll have hell to pay.”
In Arizona, Secretary of State Adrian Fontes said the state’s vote-by-mail system was designed by Republicans and has delivered secure elections for decades, and that it is now used by 80% of voters. “Donald Trump is attempting to pick his desired list of voters in each state with the Social Security Administration’s help,” Fontes said. “We will not let this stand,” he added.
The executive order follows earlier legal fights between Oregon and the Trump administration.
In January, a federal judge threw out a lawsuit that would have required the state to share private voter data with the Trump administration. Another judge ruled in favor of Oregon and Washington in lawsuits against the Trump administration, blocking the administration’s first executive order from March 2025.
The order comes as the Save America Act, which would require voter ID and proof of citizenship to vote, has stalled in Congress.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
