How Safe Is the Vote?
Eight Election Experts Weigh Trump’s Midterm Threats
Two big questions hover over this year’s midterm elections, which are less than 30 days away. The first: Who will emerge with control of Congress? The second: How will the elections be conducted, given the Trump administration’s attempts to exert control over the process? Will they be fair? Unimpeded? Chaotic?
Times Opinion asked eight people with years of experience in election law and practice to weigh in. Their answers reflect some confidence that the election will be fine — with caveats.
Related Knowledge Center: Voting rights
As Republicans move to restrict voting rights, and Donald Trump appears to be preparing for another confrontation about election results, a wide range of organizations are pushing back.
Top guidance in the run-up to Election Day
- Ben Wikler, a political organizer who was chairman of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin from 2019 to 2025 says, “The very most powerful thing you can do as a volunteer in politics is to talk to your actual friends and family who are fence-sitters.”
- He quotes Abraham Lincoln, who wrote in a letter to a campaign committee in 1840: “Keep a constant watch on the doubtful voters, and from time to time have them talked to by those in whom they have the most confidence.”
- The place to put our energy, Wikler says, is on the people whose votes will matter most because they live in a place with high-stakes, very close elections, as well as the people where we live.
- ACLU: Know your voting rights | How the ACLU is safeguarding the election
- Report intimidation, at the polls or elsewhere, immediately to the Election Protection Hotline at 1-866-OUR-VOTE or 1-888-VE-Y-VOTA (en Español).