Trump signed EO 14248 requiring documentary proof of citizenship on the federal voter registration form

On March 25, 2025, President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 14248, "Preserving and Protecting the Integrity of American Elections," directing the Election Assistance Commission to add documentary proof of U.S. citizenship — a U.S. passport, REAL ID Act-compliant identification, or military ID — as a mandatory requirement on the federal National Mail Voter Registration Form. The EAC is an independent, bipartisan commission created by Congress under the Help America Vote Act of 2002, with statutory authority over the design and content of that form; the order directed it to comply within thirty days.

Congress holds authority over federal election procedures under the Elections Clause of the Constitution, and the EAC's mandate was established by statute. Federal courts ruling on challenges to EO 14248 found that Trump lacked statutory or constitutional authority to direct the independent commission to alter the form's requirements. A federal court permanently enjoined the citizenship-proof mandate, ruling it unlawful. The Campaign Legal Center estimated the requirement would apply to approximately 21 million eligible U.S. voters who lack readily accessible citizenship documentation such as passports, disproportionately affecting younger voters, voters of color, and lower-income voters.

Beyond the registration requirement, EO 14248 directed DOGE and the Department of Homeland Security to compare state voter registration rolls against federal immigration databases — including through subpoena — creating a voter-suppression mechanism through data-matching errors that have historically flagged eligible citizens as ineligible. The order also instructed the Attorney General to enforce prohibitions on counting ballots received after Election Day and directed federal agencies to withhold election-administration funding from states that did not comply with the citizenship-proof mandate and post-Election Day rules. EO 14248 is the executive precursor to the SAVE Act (H.R. 22), a 2026 legislative version of the same citizenship-proof requirement, which is separately archived.

Updates

2026-09-01 — DHS launched a "State Citizenship Lists Portal" implementing EO 14248's voter-roll cross-check mandate [4]

DHS published a webpage for a "State Citizenship Lists Portal," intended to centralize federal data into eligible-voter lists for all 50 states as part of a national voter registry ahead of the midterm elections, with an internal memo targeting full functionality by September 4, 2026. Voting and privacy experts said no statute authorizes the federal government to compile such a nationwide database, which states and localities have traditionally managed. The Electronic Privacy Information Center sued DHS and the Social Security Administration over the effort, arguing no statute authorizes them to share and centralize Americans' personal data this way.

2026-09-02 — ICE solicited a $2–5 million contract to acquire nationwide voter data [5]

ICE disclosed plans to award a contractor $2 million to $5 million to acquire and handle voter registration and history files from up to all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and U.S. territories, to support Homeland Security Investigations "fraud detection" efforts; the request-for-information comment period closed August 28, 2026, with a solicitation expected the following week. For states that restrict commercial access to voter data, DHS planned to issue authorization letters to bypass those restrictions. A privacy-policy analyst said the approach would evade voter privacy protections and risked exposing eligible voters to disenfranchisement.