Welcome to the July edition of The Lever, featuring expert insights and analysis from Voting Rights Lab. In this month’s newsletter, we’re diving into the key state legislative trends shaping elections this year. Plus, we’re highlighting new research from Protect Democracy, recent reporting on election certification challenges, and new laws to protect election workers.

Even as a major election approaches, state lawmakers across the country continue to change the rules governing our elections. All told, three key election-related trends from the 2024 legislative sessions could have a big impact come November:

1. States criminalize the ballot box.
2. States add burdensome and unnecessary proof of citizenship requirements.
3. States engage in cross-partisan efforts to safeguard our elections.

The New York Times and Washington Post reported on a covert, coordinated strategy to refuse to certify election results and/or disrupt the voting process this November. From the New York Times:

“Mr. Trump’s allies have followed a two-pronged approach: restricting voting for partisan advantage ahead of Election Day and short-circuiting the process of ratifying the winner afterward, if Mr. Trump loses. The latter strategy involves an ambitious — and legally dubious — attempt to reimagine decades of settled law dictating how results are officially certified in the weeks before the transfer of power.

“At the heart of the strategy is a drive to convince voters that the election is about to be stolen, even without evidence. Democrats use mail voting, drop boxes and voter registration drives to swing elections, they have argued. And Mr. Trump’s indictments and criminal conviction are a Biden administration gambit to interfere with the election, they claim.”

Our friends at Protect Democracy released a report last month on the current trend of mass voter challenges. Since 2020, mass pre-election challenges to voter eligibility have emerged as a tool to stoke fears of voter fraud. While the vast majority of these challenges are deemed invalid, these challenges still do more harm than good: they can overwhelm officials, intimidate voters, and discourage participation in our elections.

“Ultimately mass challenges represent little more than a clumsy, inaccurate effort to duplicate the work election officials already do to maintain registration lists.”