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A grassroots revolt against automated license plate readers, or ALPRs, has gained momentum across the United States.

ALPRs are AI-powered cameras that capture images of all passing vehicles. The camera systems turn details into datapoints searchable by anyone with access to the information.

Today, there are more than 130,000 ALPRs on U.S. streets. And more than 5,000 law enforcement agencies use cameras produced by a single manufacturer, Flock Safety, which says its cameras have helped law enforcement agencies identify and arrest criminals and reduce crime.

But some members of those police departments have abused the data gathered by ALPRs. A police officer in Kansas was sentenced to 18 months probabtion in April 2023 for using Flock camera to stalk his estranged wife. A Florida police officer was fired and arrested in March 2026 for using data gathered by ALPRs to stalk a woman he had previously harassed on a TV set. And activists filed a lawsuit against California police departments in October 2021 for illegally sharing information collected from ALPRs with out-of-state and federal agencies, including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Due to public outcry, cities across the U.S. have rejected and canceled contracts with Flock. In September 2026, Florida’s Department of Transportation revoked permits for ALPRs on its highway system.

That has not been enough to quell growing backlash over the cameras. In at least 36 states, opponents of the technology have taken matters into their own hands, destroying or impairing ALPRs rather than wait for local governments to step in.

As a historian of the American Revolution, I see parallels between Americans’ revolt against ALPRs and colonists’ destructive and often violent pushback to late 18th-century British rule.

If this summer’s celebrations marking the 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding failed to inspire widespread patriotism, the increasingly bipartisan revolution against ALPRs suggests Americans have not entirely lost their rebellious spirit.

Troublesome colonists

From the start, the English colonists of North America proved to be a thorn in the side of the government. Despite British hopes that investing in American colonies would enrich England, these ventures proved to be more costly than they were profitable. Colonists bore much of the blame.

When the British Parliament passed laws meant to regulate trade in the 1660s, colonists across the Eastern Seaboard turned to smuggling rather than comply.

American merchants and consumers preferred to trade directly with both their fellow English colonists and merchants in the French and Dutch colonies rather than have that trade controlled by ministers in London.

The British government had little ability to enforce the law.

Britain pushes back

That changed in 1763, after British forces vanquished the French Empire from North America at tremendous cost. A new prime minister, George Grenville, led a series of reforms aimed at making the colonists pay for their own military protection.

Many Americans often believe that the Revolution began as a revolt against higher taxes. But most of the reforms coming from London actually lowered taxes to make smuggled goods less appealing.

What colonists really resented was the imperial government’s growing influence in their lives.

In 1767, Parliament passed a series of laws that allowed Britain to raise revenue to pay the salaries of colonial governors, attorneys general and judges. At the same time, Parliament sent troops to cities such as Boston to protect its officials. Competition for work and strained community relationships often led to violence between British soldiers and colonists.

American colonists turn to violence

The same year, angry colonists in Boston, New York and Philadelphia began boycotting British goods. Prominent Americans, including Benjamin Franklin and John Dickinson, endorsed these nonviolent protests.

But more radical leaders believed colonists needed to take more decisive action.

On the night of Dec. 16, 1773, members of the paramilitary group the Sons of Liberty dumped nearly £10,000 – almost US$2 million in today’s dollars – worth of privately owned tea into Boston Harbor.

A few weeks later, the Sons of Liberty struck again. This time they attacked fellow colonist and British supporter John Malcolm, covering him in tar and feathers. For five hours, they beat him and paraded him through the streets. Similar instances of destruction and violence occurred across the colonies.

The British responded harshly. In May 1774, Gen. Thomas Gage arrived at Boston as the colony’s new military governor. He implemented the so-called “Coercive Acts,” which closed the port of Boston and disbanded local government, among other measures.

Surveillance backfires

By early 1775, Boston was besieged. Around 5,000 British troops roamed the streets, directed by Gage to gather information on the Sons of Liberty and arrest leading dissidents.

Gage hoped heightened surveillance would quell unrest. But it only pushed more citizens into the radicals’ camp. On the night of April 18, 1775, a discrete network of watchmen eluded British surveillance and famously hanged two lanterns from the steeple atop Christ Church. These beacons signaled that Gage’s troops were crossing the Charles River, on their way to seize colonial stores of gunpowder and ammunition, setting in motion the events that would begin the American Revolution.

In response to the widespread pushback to ALPRs, Flock Safety CEO Garett Langley appealed to history. In June 2026 he authored a post on the company’s website, arguing that detractors misunderstand Ben Franklin’s famous 1755 quote, “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”

In an August 2026 interview, Langley referenced the auto industry, noting that rather than ban cars after an uptick in collision fatalities, legislatures mandated seat belts and airbags. Drawing parallels to the contemporary debate around ALPRs, Langley suggested Americans should again prioritize safety and hoped Americans would be willing to “compromise” on issues of privacy.

Samuel Adams, one of the most prominent leaders of the Sons of Liberty, had his own opinion on compromise. Writing in June 1771, he explained that although Americans had “disagreed among themselves in one mode of opposition to arbitrary measures,” they were “united in the main principles of constitutional & natural liberty.”

Adams believed that, when threatened, American colonists would come together to defend their liberties. Clearly, Adams’ opinion resonates today.

G. Patrick O’Brien does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

News stories about campaign finance are frequent in any election season, and this year is no exception.

In Ohio, for instance, NBC reported in August 2026 that there had been over US$130 million in outside spending in the state’s U.S. Senate race. The story also summarized how much money the two candidates had raised from different categories of supporters, such as the proprietors of nursing homes, labor unions and small donors.

It can be hard for the average person to think about these things. It’s hard to know what a normal amount of money is, what it means for a candidate to receive money from particular kinds of donors, or what the impact of this money has on elections.

Money is an essential part of elections, yet many Americans view campaign finance as a sign of corruption. They may have a point – but it is still important to understand the nuances of our system in order to decide what is corruption and what is just regular politics.

Campaign funding has changed dramatically in the past two decades. In the most competitive races, spending by outside groups – organizations other than candidates or parties – has increased from a small percentage of spending in the early 2000s to an amount that exceeds what candidates themselves spend. Super PACs or “dark money” groups can spend millions of dollars quickly, putting pressure on candidates to raise more money just in case.

I’m a political scientist who studies and writes about campaign finance laws and practices. As confusing as campaign spending may appear to be, there are still some basic rules anyone can use to understand information about money in elections. While most of my examples here are about federal elections, these rules apply to state and local campaigns as well.

Rule #1: Every campaign is more expensive than the last one.

This is partly a matter of inflation, but the cost of the average campaign has grown at a rate even faster than inflation. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan group that tracks money in politics, $9.5 billion was spent on congressional elections in 2024, compared with $8.8 billion in 2020.

This looks like an increase, but when you adjust for inflation, it’s not. But if you compare elections over the past decade, overall spending has nearly doubled, from $5.1 billion – adjusted for inflation – in 2014 to $9.5 billion in 2024. The decline in the number of congressional seats that are truly competitive in the general election means that this money is now concentrated in far fewer races than it was in the past.

Rule #2: Smart donors don’t give money to candidates with no chance of winning.

If you compare the candidates in each of the 468 or so congressional races, the candidate with the most money wins over 90% of the time. But most of these races feature a popular incumbent who is almost certain to win. Such candidates tend to raise respectable sums of money, but they don’t win because they have raised more – they raise more because they are certain to win. Who would want to give money to a candidate who is doomed to lose?

Rule #3: It’s good to have money – but it’s better not to need it.

If you consider the most competitive races, it becomes clear that the candidates who raise the most money overall are usually the ones who need it most. In the case of incumbents, these are the ones who face the toughest reelection challenges and are the most likely to lose.

These are the races that draw the most money from out of state or from outside groups. In the most expensive races – the ones where both candidates raise a lot – it matters a lot less who has raised the most than in the less competitive ones. It’s one thing to outraise your opponent by $500,000 or more in a race where neither of you has raised more than $1 million. But it’s another thing to outraise your opponent by a similar amount in a race where each of you has raised $20 million or more.

Rule #4: Home state donors matter more.

If a candidate has raised a lot of money from interest groups or from wealthy residents of another state, that is helpful to their campaign, but those people cannot vote for the candidate.

Conversely, if a candidate has raised that money from people in their community, the contributions are a sign that those same people will likely vote for them, campaign for them, and tell their friends to support them. The total value of these contributions, then, is less important than what they signify.

Rule #5: Small donations, particularly from out of state, suggest that a campaign has some sort of unique appeal.

Some candidates will boast about receiving much of their money from small donations. U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, proudly says that her average contribution is $21.

Candidates who can do this – attract support from regular people who give modest sums – tend to be more progressive or conservative than the average candidate, or to have some sort of feature that makes them stand out to people across the country.

Just as importantly, the types of people who make small contributions also tend to be more ideologically extreme than the average voter. Many of these donors do not reside in the district where the campaign is happening, but are mobilized by emails or other online communications.

Rule #6: Super PACs can spend money quickly, but they can’t do the things candidates can.

Super PACS are political committees that engage in advocacy about candidates but cannot give money to candidates or communicate directly with them. Many news stories compare candidate fundraising to super PAC support.

To an extent, it’s better for a candidate to have money in their own campaign fund than to have super PAC support. That’s because candidates know better than outside groups the best way to spend money, they have an easier time spending money on grassroots campaigning, and their money comes from a larger number of people – and therefore it is a sign of broader support.

But it is not difficult for super PACs to learn how they can help candidates even though their staff cannot speak directly with them.

A careful look at a candidate’s webpage or candidate advertising can tell groups what a candidate wants to talk about and who the candidate is trying to reach. Because super PACs can raise unlimited amounts of money from a single donor, they can jump into a race and spend millions of dollars quickly. Even though they may not get more bang for the buck, they can change a race with a large advertising buy.

Rule #7: Party money can be more helpful to candidates than super PAC money.

The Supreme Court recently abolished limits on coordinated spending by political parties for candidates. Because they do not always know local politics as well as their candidates do, parties cannot spend money quite as efficiently as candidates.

However, they tend to have larger, more experienced staffs than super PACs, and therefore they know more about how best to help their candidates than super PACs do. Parties also have access to voter information that super PACs do not. Parties and candidates also can now receive discounts on advertising expenses that outside groups do not.

Rule #8: Little is gained from knowing donor occupations or employers.

The Federal Election Commission requires people who give more than $200 to a federal candidate to disclose their employer.

Some analyses will report the money that candidates get from the employees of particular companies. This is misleading – just because someone is employed in a certain business or company doesn’t mean they are giving to help their employer.

The University of California, for instance, has many reasonably well-paid employees, and some of them give money to candidates. This doesn’t mean the University of California has any role in the election.

Similarly, the most common occupations of donors are often “retired” and “self-employed.” Campaign contributors tend to be older than other Americans, but beyond this, there is little to be gained from knowing this employer information. And the “self-employed” include such a wide range of people – from consultants to landscapers – that this category is similarly meaningless.

Robert Boatright does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

Donald Trump is a Republican and self-avowed nationalist. That, apparently, is true in an Irish sense, too – even if those terms have very different meanings across the Atlantic.

On Sept. 12, 2026, while seated next to taoiseach, the Irish title for prime minister, Micheál Martin, the U.S. president stated that he would “love to see” Ireland unified and that it is “going to happen eventually,” so it “may as well happen now.”

The next day he called reunification “a cool thing” but noted, “No matter what you say or how you say it, there’s no good answer.”

While such comments may have been welcomed by some supporters of unification both in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland – or “republicans” and “nationalists” in Irish political parlance – Trump’s comments were generally denounced by all parties, including the taoiseach.

The comments likewise set off a firestorm among Northern Irish unionists, who wish the region to remain part of the United Kingdom, as well as British conservatives and Trump allies such as Nigel Farage, who likewise insist that Northern Ireland should always remain part of the United Kingdom.

As an expert in Irish-American history, I view Trump’s comments as a break from recent precedent.

Since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement – which politically resolved the rumbling civil war known as the Troubles and achieved cooperation between the North, the Republic, and the U.K. – U.S. presidents have formally adopted a policy of neutrality when it comes to the question of Irish unification. Instead, Trump’s intervention hearkens back to an earlier age in which American presidents were often more opinionated on the issue of Irish nationalism.

Irish blood in the White House

Ireland first became a colony of Britain in the 12th century and regularly faced discriminatory polices, such as 17th- and 18th-century penal laws, which prevented Catholics and, to a lesser degree, Presbyterians from entering the upper tier of the socioeconomic strata. That led to widespread anti-English sentiment on much of the island.

Irish nationalism, which called for independence from Great Britain, became popular during the late 18th century, around the same time American colonists defeated the British after declaring an independent United States. Many Irish had already emigrated to the American colonies, but immigration would increase dramatically during the 19th century as Ireland faced famine and disease.

Irish, and especially Irish-American, nationalists tended to look at America as a model and possibly an ally in obtaining independence. As such, they often promoted their agenda to U.S. presidents.

Andrew Jackson, whose parents emigrated from Carrickfergus, County Antrim now in Northern Ireland, was the first president of Irish ancestry. In 1833, he pronounced to the Charitable Irish Society in Boston, “I have always been proud of my ancestry, and of being descended from the noble race.”

In an 1842 letter to Thomas Mooney, an advocate of Irish independence in New York, Jackson wrote: “That the Irish blood which flows in my veins will never cease, but with my life alone, to beat in unison with those who have at heart the very security of Irish liberty.”

However, Jackson’s words, while likely sincere, never resulted in a tangible policy or action to assist Ireland.

Support for an Irish revolution?

The Irish revolutionaries the Fenians, also known as the Irish Republican Brotherhood in the United States, appealed to a succession of U.S. presidents for assistance without success. Formed in the late 1850s and popularized after the American Civil War, Fenians had hoped that Andrew Johnson, and later Ulysses S. Grant, would support an Irish revolution.

Hoping to benefit from American-Anglo tensions during the Civil War, in which the British unofficially supported the Confederacy, the Fenian Bernard Killian claimed that Johnson and his secretary of state, William Seward, had privately assured him that they supported a Fenian invasion of Canada, then a colony of Great Britain.

The Fenians hoped that a successful invasion might lead to a war between the U.S. and U.K., which would result in a free Ireland. But both Johnson and Seward publicly refuted Killian’s claim. But their need for Irish votes in the upcoming 1866 midterm election might explain their private support.

Regardless of the conflicting versions of the conversation, when the short-lived invasion took place in 1866, Johnson had many of the Fenians arrested for violating neutrality laws.

Most 19th-century Irish Americans supported the Democratic Party because the Republican Party was widely seen as anti-Catholic and xenophobic.

However, Grant, a Republican, became president in 1869 with the support of many Irish Americans, especially Fenians who had fought for the Union in the Civil War.

They hoped that his frustration with the English during the war would lead to his support of independence in Ireland. Once again, they found a president unwilling to assist their conquest of Canada or even their filibustering excursions into Central America and Cuba, where rogue groups hoped to annex territories to become part of the U.S.

Distancing, then embracing Republicans

President Woodrow Wilson hoped that the mass slaughter of World War I would lead to dramatic reform that would prevent future atrocities. In his Fourteen Points, Wilson exclaimed, “It’s the principle of justice to all peoples of all nationalities, and their right to live on equal terms of liberty and safety with one another whether they be strong or weak.”

Unfortunately, Irish nationalists such as John Devoy, excited at the prospect of British decolonization, soon discovered that Wilson’s vision of self-determination was far less universal than he had implied.

Supporting their wartime British ally, Wilson and the U.S. declined to support the Irish nationalists during the Irish War of Independence between 1919 and 1921. In 1922, the Anglo-Irish Treaty created the Irish Free State – now the Republic – and partitioned it from Northern Ireland, which remained part of the United Kingdom. After a brief civil war in Ireland between pro-treaty and anti-treaty forces, U.S. President Calvin Coolidge established relations with the Free State government in Dublin, infuriating the anti-treaty Irish Republican Army.

John F. Kennedy, the president most associated with his Irish ancestry and the first sitting president to visit Ireland in 1963, mostly avoided the question of unification as president – although he was quite outspoken in favor as a senator. But he did note to the Irish parliament, “No people ever believed more deeply in the cause of Irish freedom than the people of the United States.”

During the Cold War, U.S. presidents were reticent to support Irish unification in order not to upset their British allies. But after the Cold War, President Bill Clinton invited Gerry Adams, the head of Sinn Fein – widely seen as the political arm of the IRA – to visit the White House, despite the protests of British Prime Minister John Major.

Eventually, Clinton would become an important part of the process that led to the Good Friday Agreement, partially due to his avowed neutrality on the question of unification. Presidents since have continued to adopt a policy of neutrality.

Toward reunification? Perhaps not

Trump, who has been compared to Andrew Jackson for his lack of conventional diplomacy, perhaps unsurprisingly has now agreed with Jackson that Irish independence would be good for the Irish people.

Although unlikely familiar with this history, he has perhaps unintentionally sided with past presidents as well as the people who live on the island. In a recent European Union poll, 63% of people in Northern Ireland said they would vote for unification, while 59% of the people in the Republic would support it.

Still, 29% of the Northern Irish and 22% of the Republic oppose it. And given the vocal opposition of the British government, unification is not likely to happen soon, no matter what the U.S. president wants.

Bryan McGovern does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

In January 2026, President Donald Trump told an audience of business and political leaders in Davos, Switzerland, that the United States needed the “right, title and ownership” to Greenland “because you need the ownership to defend it. You can’t defend it on a lease.”

A territory of roughly 57,000 people appears to the president as property to be acquired.

Trump’s various actions during his second term have prompted no shortage of explanations. The “flooding the zone” strategy treats his flurry of executive orders and legal battles as efforts to overwhelm the courts’ and news media’s ability to keep up. Psychological explanations of Trump’s behavior point to narcissism. Other political commentators interpret his actions through authoritarianism and demagoguery.

I believe these accounts overlook something simpler. Before entering politics, Trump spent five decades running a commercial real estate business. In my assessment, he still reasons the way his professional career taught him to.

I study how forms of reasoning shape political arguments, and in analyzing Trump’s rhetoric across his second term, I find a president who approaches governing through the same framework as his business career – a mode of thinking I call portfolio reasoning.

Portfolio theory

Portfolio reasoning is a financial way of thinking that treats what one has – from property and money to relationships and obligations – as a collection of holdings to be continually managed and reassessed to maximize its value.

The recurring questions are familiar: What do I have? What is performing well and what isn’t? What should I keep, acquire, renegotiate or get rid of? And how do I make sure I can walk away?

Modern portfolio theory originated with economist Harry Markowitz in the 1950s as a way to manage financial risk. As finance came to dominate the wider economy, these habits spread well beyond Wall Street.

Consider a college sophomore today who, between classes, checks which stocks to hold or sell on the financial services platform Robinhood, reshuffles a fantasy football roster based on changing player values, and adjusts bets on future cultural and political events on a prediction market. Across very different activities, the same habit is at work: managing a shifting set of positions as their value changes.

The US, a flagship holding

It’s not difficult to imagine Trump’s second term through this lens.

According to portfolio theory, the soaring stock market, foreign investment growth and more tariff revenue become proof of the United States’ rising value. Previous presidents were bad negotiators who left money on the table. Alliances, treaties and obligations become holdings whose worth depends on maximizing their returns through continuous renegotiation. And states that vote the wrong way become candidates for divestment.

But a resemblance is not evidence. The more important question is whether Trump’s own words show that he reasons about politics this way.

Trump’s rhetoric repeatedly casts the U.S. as the flagship holding whose value he was elected to increase. He opened his 2026 State of the Union address by announcing that the nation was “back, bigger, better, richer and stronger than ever before.” The evidence that followed read like an investment performance report: The stock market had set “53 all-time record highs,” and the typical 401(k) was “up by at least $30,000.”

At a Las Vegas rally in August, he put it in the language of capital flows: “Money is pouring” into the U.S.

In Davos in January, in the State of the Union in February and again in Las Vegas in August, Trump described the country he inherited as a “dead country” that is now “the hottest country anywhere in the world.”

It’s the language of a distressed property turned around.

Holdings are continuously reassessed

Existing holdings get reassessed by Trump, too, and those judged to be underperforming are repriced.

In his State of the Union, Trump reported that NATO members had “just agreed, at my very strong request, to pay 5% of GDP for military defense rather than the 2%.” He added that the U.S. had been “paying the freight of many of them” and that NATO now pays in full for weapons sent to Ukraine.

Canada has faced the same reassessment. When it sought coverage under the proposed Golden Dome missile defense system, Trump put a price on protection – some $71 billion. He then offered an alternative: “Why don’t you just join our country? Become the 51st state and you get it for free.”

In this case, long-standing terms are reopened because one side can afford to walk away and the other cannot.

Portfolios acquire new positions

A portfolio also grows by acquiring what it doesn’t yet own.

Greenland is the clearest geopolitical example – Trump wants ownership, not access.

Venezuela follows a similar logic. After American forces removed President Nicolás Maduro, Trump announced that Venezuela would transfer up to 50 million barrels of oil. He said U.S. companies would go in and “start making money,” and noted that the country had been “pumping almost nothing by comparison to what they could have been” – an underperforming asset with a plan to improve it.

Not every acquisition is territorial. Since 2025, the federal government has taken ownership positions in roughly 30 companies, including 9.9% of Intel.

Portfolio reasoning and democratic limits

It’s fair to ask whether this is simply a more explicit version of what presidents have always done: pursue growth, expand power, defend the country’s interests.

Trump officials have suggested as much. White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller has described a world “governed by strength,” “force” and “power” – what he called “the iron laws of the world that have existed since the beginning of time.”

The difference has to do with limits – what stays open to negotiation and what doesn’t. Democratic governments may renegotiate treaties and alliances, but they also make durable commitments that are not continually reassessed according to what produces the best return.

Portfolio reasoning favors keeping your options open as circumstances change. Commitments are therefore provisional: Keep a position if it yields a high return, renegotiate if it doesn’t, and exit if something better comes along.

Trump applies that logic to nearly everything, leaving few political commitments settled and helping to explain the turbulence of his second term.

A second limit concerns the public. Viewed through a portfolio framework, people appear less as parties whose claims must be answered than as positions to be valued – assets when they contribute, liabilities when they don’t. Portfolio reasoning can assess value and risk. It cannot, by itself, distinguish right from wrong.

Applied to a population, portfolio logic does not necessarily deny human rights, but it offers no reason of its own for putting them beyond the reach of calculation. A portfolio presidency is not anti-democratic so much as indifferent: Democratic commitments have no privileged place in its financial calculations.

J. Christian Spielvogel does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

Hosts Robert Jacobi and Dave Lockie have a conversation about AI impacts, open source priorities, data privacy, and emerging alternative network technologies

Mail voting in the 2026 midterm elections will go on as usual – now that the Trump administration’s major efforts to disrupt how Americans vote by mail have been blocked by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The U.S. Postal Service had recently implemented new rules placing unprecedented restrictions on the practice of mail voting in federal elections. State officials and voting rights organizations immediately challenged these rules, arguing that the executive agency has no authority under the U.S. Constitution to unilaterally regulate election practices.

On Sept. 14, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court signaled agreement with these claims, voting 7-2 to uphold a preliminary injunction blocking enforcement of the new rules. The injunction will likely remain in place through the November midterm elections.

The controversy began in March 2026, when President Donald Trump issued an executive order designed to ensure “integrity in federal elections.” The executive order mandates – among other things – that the U.S. Postal Service implement uniform ballot and envelope requirements for mail and absentee ballots used in federal elections.

The order also required states to provide the Postal Service, 60 days prior to Election Day, with lists of all voters eligible to vote by mail or absentee. If a ballot sent via mail didn’t comply with the Postal Service’s requirements, or was sent by somebody not on a state-provided list, the order instructed the USPS to not deliver the ballot, effectively canceling that vote.

Two lawsuits challenging the executive order were immediately filed in federal court, one by state officials and the other by voting rights organizations.

Their arguments were straightforward: The president does not possess unilateral authority to alter the methods of voting in federal elections. Rather, the elections clause of the Constitution vests the authority to regulate the “time, place, and manner” of federal elections in the states. Congress also has the authority to regulate federal elections, if it chooses to do so.

Federal judge rules against administration

The two lawsuits were heard by the same U.S. District Court judge in Boston, who ultimately agreed with the plaintiffs and issued injunctions against the federal government. Those injunctions forbade the president and all relevant federal officials and agencies, including the USPS, from carrying out any aspects of the executive order regarding mail and absentee voting.

The lawsuit led by state officials ultimately made its way to the Supreme Court, which on Aug. 24 voted 6-3 along ideological lines in favor of the Trump administration. The court did not decide on the constitutional issues raised in the case but instead found that the states lacked the injury necessary to have standing to bring the case. The court reasoned that because the USPS had yet to implement the executive order, the states were not yet affected by it.

At the same time, the USPS began writing the rules and processes governing how it would carry out the executive order. These steps blatantly violated the remaining injunction in the voting rights organizations’ lawsuit. But the District Court judge ended up dissolving that injunction on Aug. 26 in light of the Supreme Court’s decision in the other case.

That same day, the USPS officially published its new rules for mail ballots.

Widespread confusion

The USPS rules contained three key provisions.

First, states must design their ballot envelopes in accordance with USPS requirements, and the envelopes must be submitted to the USPS for final approval. Second, state and local election officials must input the names of voters qualified to vote by mail or absentee into a USPS-run electronic portal at least 30 days before the date of a federal election. Last, any mailed ballot that does not adhere to the design requirements, or that is sent by somebody not on the Postal Service’s electronic portal, “will not be accepted” by the USPS.

These rules led to widespread confusion among election officials, who remained uncertain about how to apply them to the 2026 midterm elections. For one, the rules laid out no clear deadline for USPS approval of envelope designs. Moreover, the electronic portal’s 30-day deadline conflicted with state voter registration deadlines, with all states allowing individuals to register to vote at some point within 30 days of Election Day, and many far later.

Election officials were also left wondering how to adhere to these rules under such short notice. Some states, such as North Carolina, have already distributed mail ballots to voters. Election officials in Utah, meanwhile, were considering setting up their own distribution centers to bypass the USPS rules.

Following enactment of the USPS rules, the plaintiffs from the original two lawsuits renewed their constitutional challenge, arguing that they now had standing to sue.

On Sept. 4, the U.S. District Court issued a new preliminary injunction pausing the implementation or enforcement of the USPS rules. The court, in short, found that the USPS likely infringed upon Congress’ and the states’ elections clause powers.

On Sept. 6, the federal government petitioned to the U.S. Supreme Court seeking a stay – or pause – on the preliminary injunction.

In its petition, the government contended that the USPS rules do not unduly impede states’ administration of elections but rather “impose reasonable preparation requirements for certain election-related mail.” The petition elicited 20 amicus briefs, largely in opposition to the USPS, including one signed by seven Republican chief election officials detailing the impracticality of the USPS rules.

On Sept. 14, the U.S. Supreme Court ultimately voted to uphold the preliminary injunction, with Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissenting.

In one brief paragraph, the court stated that the federal government “is unlikely to succeed on the merits of its challenge,” suggesting that a supermajority of the court believes the USPS exceeded its constitutional authority. Given that the litigation is still ongoing in District Court, though, the Supreme Court did not issue any final decision on the merits of the parties’ claims.

Practically speaking, this ruling likely settles the question of whether the USPS rules will have any impact on the midterm elections in November.

With less than two months until Election Day, and a preliminary injunction remaining in effect with the Supreme Court’s endorsement, the federal government’s hands are tied until the litigation over the issue fully plays out in the District Court.

By the time that happens, the country may already be looking ahead toward the 2028 presidential election.

John J. Martin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

​Politics + Society – The Conversation

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In his keynote address to the Republican midterm convention on Sept. 9, 2026, President Donald Trump promised that if Republicans retain control of Congress in November, he would authorize a US$5,000 payment to every American adult.

Trump’s offer seems to run afoul of federal laws, which make it a crime to pay for votes.

After Trump’s speech, political commentator Sam Stein posted on X: “trump openly bribing people to vote for republicans. $5k per person if republicans hold the house and the senate?”

Stein was not alone in referencing bribery. Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy group, issued the following statement after Trump’s speech: “Trump knows he can’t do this, and yet he’s attempting to bribe voters with the false promise of cash to help his party win an election.”

But as a scholar of political and legal rhetoric, I think it’s worth further examining what the president said and whether his promise violated any law.

An American tradition

Paying voters to support a particular candidate, or promising government jobs in exchange for votes, has a long history in the United States. It was a staple of machine politics in big cities starting in the late 19th century.

The political scholar Simeon Nichter argues that it would be better to describe these practices as examples of “turnout buying.” He notes that “observers in various U.S. cities have complained that some politicians use ‘street money’ – small, unreported cash payments ostensibly used for legal get-out-the-vote efforts such as canvassing and transporting voters – as direct payments for turnout.”

What Nichter describes has made a comeback in our era.

Recall Elon Musk’s effort to ensure a Republican victory in a 2025 state Supreme Court election in Wisconsin. He spent millions in that effort and, as The Associated Press reported, offered “$1 million to people who voted in the Supreme Court election” to encourage them to vote.

In July 2026, the Wisconsin Elections Commission found enough evidence to refer citizen complaints about Musk’s behavior to a district attorney, “which can choose,” as the AP notes, “to bring criminal charges over violating the state law against election bribery.”

A month later, a state prosecutor said he could not prove Musk’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and would not bring charges.

Federal law

Because state and federal laws differ, we can’t extrapolate from the Wisconsin decision to Trump’s $5,000 promise.

Two provisions of federal law relating to vote buying were adopted by Congress and became law in 1948. Both treated that practice as a form of election interference.

The first reads as follows: “Whoever makes or offers to make an expenditure to any person, either to vote or withhold his vote, or to vote for or against any candidate; and whoever solicits, accepts, or receives any such expenditure in consideration of his vote or the withholding of his vote; Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned … or both.”

The second prohibits offering government benefits “to any person as consideration, favor, or reward for any political activity or for the support of or opposition to any candidate or any political party in connection with any … election to any political office.”

Both provisions focus on the use of money or the promise of benefits to get individuals to vote in a particular way.

But Trump did not make his offer to any particular voter or set of voters. And, unlike Musk, he was acting as a public figure. The president’s promise was directed to all voters, not just to those who vote Republican.

John Day, a former federal prosecutor, compared Trump’s “dividend” to a pledge to deliver a tax break. “A promise to lower taxes also gives voters a financial reason to support a candidate, but that does not, by itself, make the promise a bribe,” Day told The New York Times.

Supreme Court precedent

In 1982, in Brown v. Hartlage, the Supreme Court weighed in on the legality of political figures promising financial benefits to voters. It found nothing wrong with the practice so long as the benefit was not offered as a quid pro quo to a particular voter.

Writing for a unanimous court, Justice William Brennan said that a political candidate “no less than any other person, has a First Amendment right to engage in the discussion of public issues and vigorously and tirelessly to advocate his own election and the election of other candidates.”

In his view, that right includes making statements about financial gains voters might receive if a candidate or a party wins an election, as long as they were “made openly and were subject to the criticism of his political opponent and to the scrutiny of the voters.” Such statements, Brennan added, were different from “corrupting private agreements and solicitations historically recognized as unprotected by the First Amendment.”

The Hartlage decision remains the applicable precedent today.

A year after the court’s decision, however, legal scholars Peter Aranson and Kenneth Shepsle argued that the Supreme Court decision countered several lower court decisions that had treated promises of the kind the high court approved “as analogous to bribes, which would turn the citizenry’s attention away from ‘proper’ public policy issues.”

Trump may view the question of whether Republicans retain control of Congress as just such an issue.

Beyond legality

Whatever Trump’s view, commentators have observed that in Trump’s world, relationships are transactional. It is the deal that counts, not the values it promotes or undermines. So, the importance of Trump’s cash offer goes beyond the legal question of whether it is bribery, vote buying or a legitimate political promise.

It’s worth focusing attention on the virtues and vices of the transactional approach to politics, what it does to the character of U.S. political life and to the way Americans see the world.

One of Trump’s critics, the former presidential speechwriter Peter Wehner, describes what he calls “the great civic danger posed by Donald Trump” this way: “that the habits of his heart become the habits of our hearts: that his code of conduct becomes ours.”

Whether or not he is right, Wehner points Americans to a domain beyond law as the right place to assess the president’s promise of a “Trump Dividend.”

Austin Sarat does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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