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An early episode of South Park features a subplot in which tiny gnomes sneak into the houses of South Park residents in order to steal their underpants. When asked why, they explain that collecting underpants is just the beginning: “Well, Phase 1, we collect underpants.” “What about Phase 2?” “Well, Phase 3 is profit.” When pressed, they explain again: “You see, Phase 1, collect underpants. Phase 2 … [silence]. Phase 3, profit.”
It’s a beautifully crisp lampooning of half-baked ideas, built for business plans but readily adaptable to any sort of scheme. And it’s profoundly relevant to the current electoral conversations.
Last month, President Trump noted that Vladimir Putin had suggested that he ban mail-in voting. Leave aside for a moment the provenance of the idea. Leave aside the fact that Trump is one of the millions of Americans who has (reliably, successfully) voted by mail. Leave aside the fact that Republicans, backed by infrequent voters, probably hurt themselves most right now by changing existing rules. The president has no power to ban mail-in voting.
Yet the following week, Trump reiterated his desire to end mail-in voting — and added that he’d be issuing an executive order to require voter ID. The president has no power to require voter ID either.
More recently still, some in Trump’s orbit have been claiming that he will declare a national emergency to “protect” federal elections. But even if the president declared a national emergency, that declaration would have no power to change even a single election practice.
These pronouncements predictably spark frenzy. The Constitution gives no role to the president in running elections. This administration has shown a proclivity for sprinting past constitutional boundaries (though I think it notable that they largely seem to be heeding specific court orders, perhaps because those can still come with real consequences), and so people assume he’ll ignore boundaries here too. But I’m not just talking about the president’s absence of legal authority to ban mail-in voting or require voter ID. What I mean is that he has no power to do either.
Trump has some unilateral ability to move the economy, in ways legal and illegal. He has some unilateral ability to move the military, in ways illegal and illegal. He has some unilateral ability to declare national emergencies that unlock other specific authorities granted by statute. He does not have the unilateral ability to move election practices.
State and local officials run elections according to laws passed by federal and state legislatures. The president can attempt to persuade them to change their practices all day long, and in some quarters, where state legislators are amenable, he might succeed in that persuasion. That persuasion might even start looking like “persuasion,” with increasing aggression. The social media posts might start coming in ALL CAPS.
But the president is not a magical wizard. State and local officials who don’t want to listen to a presidential order on elections don’t have to listen to a presidential order on elections. And that’s not shorthand for running to court to nullify the executive order. I mean that they really don’t have to listen. An executive order is a memo to federal agencies. For a state or local official, the day after an executive order looks exactly the same as the day before. They can read the executive order in the voice of Charlie Brown’s teacher. They can — and will — just decide to not do the thing he says they have to do.
There is no question that the president commands media attention, and an executive order without any authority complicates the communications environment. It stokes confusion, and destabilizes trust in election processes that have repeatedly proven worthy of that trust. But it only has that power to disrupt if we allow it to have that power. It doesn’t change any part of how elections actually work.
In Phase 1, the president issues an executive order declaring a national emergency and purporting to change the way we vote. In Phase 3, presto, the way we vote changes.
What’s Phase 2?
Cool story. Trump raped 12-year old girls.
Release the Epstein files!! Release the Putin photos of Donnie!! Release the kraken!!!
Charlie’s in the ground, medical miracle in front of world tomorrow, but come Wednesday, back to EPSTEIN! AND MORE EPSTEIN!!
Maybe even a golden shower. But I’ll take anything.
Phase 2 in this case involves invoking the Insurrection Act, 10 USC 252.
In Phase 1 he issues an Executive Order mandating certain election security measures be taken by the folks who actually run elections. A lot of red states will probably comply, because they tend to want these things, or some of them such as voter ID, anyway. Blue states will mostly ignore these toothless non-mandates, because you are 100% correct, the president has no power to issue orders on how elections are run.
Rs will mostly win in red states, Ds will mostly win in blue states. Trump’s claim for why Ds have won in the blue states will be that this happened because they ignored his EO, and they did so because following his mandates on how to run fair elections would have hampered their ability to steal elections for the Ds. Specifically, ignoring the Trump mandates will make possible the one central means that Ds have used for decades to steal elections, letting illegals vote.
Phase 2 will consist of invoking the Insurrection Act in order to send in ICE agents to D strongholds to seize ballots and voting machines, in order to allow those forensic audits and definitive recounts that the D/RINO/Deep State conspiracy blocked in 2020 in order to steal that election. Well, this time Trump won’t have to depend on the hidebound, norm-following woke US Army to seize ballots and voting machines, he will have that new ICE army funded by the Big Beautiful Bill that he can train up without any inconvenient traditions of norm-following to get in the way of their total cooperation in stopping the steal this time.
If the audit is truly forensic and the recount truly definitive, living up the high standards of Sidney Powell, of course Trump will get his Phase 3.
The infotainment and socials will publicize and yak unendingly about all these election-related “executive orders”, as if the “orders” had any power at all. Lots of people will believe them. Oh well, looks like I can’t vote now. Can’t get out of the house and don’t have a driver’s license.
It’s up to citizens with backbone and civic responsibility to do what we can to spread the word that NO! Nothing has changed. The “president” was just gassing off. If you want to know how voting works, check with your County Clerk or Secretary of State. It’s up to THEM.
I miss the heady days when reporters couldn’t go to press or air without clear fact checking and confirmation. Now, it’s up to the rest of us.