The Blockade Brief — July 2026

Trump fired every remaining member of the Election Assistance Commission, the only federal agency built to help run elections without playing politics with them. The two Democratic commissioners were notified by email that they were terminated, effective immediately, while the lone Republican was allowed to resign instead. The commission needs three members just to take an official action. It now has zero, four months before the midterms.

The Justice Department sent letters to election officials in all 50 states and D.C., threatening them with criminal prosecution over their voter rolls. Utah's Republican Lt. Governor didn't mince words about what it felt like to get one: “Got another love letter this morning from the DOJ sprinkled throughout with threats of criminal prosecution.” Election law experts say the letters look less like the start of a real investigation and more like intimidation, since “if you really thought they committed a crime, you wouldn't be sending them a letter. You'd be bringing criminal indictments.”

In Indiana, Charrie Stambaugh has voted in every election since she became a citizen almost thirty years ago. This month, she found out by accident that her registration had been canceled under a new state law, championed by Republican Gov. Mike Braun, that requires naturalized citizens to keep re-proving their citizenship. Nearly a thousand other Indiana voters have had their registrations wiped out the same way, thanks to Indiana Republicans, many without ever getting notice.

The Supreme Court agreed to hear a case that could strip more than 43,000 Arizonans of their right to vote for president and Congress over a paperwork requirement. The voters most likely to get caught in it are college students away from home and Native American voters, who are unlikely to have easy or immediate access to a birth certificate.