What non-legal tactics have administrations used to influence election administration and how have states resisted them?
Executive summary
Administrations have used a suite of non-legal levers — coercive requests for sensitive state voter data, public threats and subpoenas, deployments of federal personnel near election operations, pressure on local officials, encouragement of private funding and information operations — to shape how elections are run and perceived [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]. States, in turn, have pushed back through refusals, litigation, statutory protections and administrative defenses that rest on the constitutional allocation of election authority to states and on federal- and state-law limits on federal presence at polling places [6] [7] [1].
1. Pressure campaigns and the demand for state voter rolls
Administrations seeking to influence administration have repeatedly leaned on executive agencies to demand state voter registration files and related records, even when legal authority is thin: the Department of Justice sued multiple states and D.C. after they refused to hand over full voter lists, prompting congressional letters and public denunciations by senators who called the effort a “strong arm” pressure campaign that risked privacy harms and unjustified purges [1] [8] [2].
2. Public threats, prosecutions and bureaucratic intimidation
Beyond data requests, administrations have used public rhetoric and prosecutorial posture to intimidate election officials and legal service providers — from explicit threats of criminal charges over 2020 results to targeting law firms that represent voting-rights groups — creating a chilling effect that can reshape administrative choices even without new laws [3] [2].
3. Deployments, physical presence and statutory limits
Efforts to alter the on-the-ground environment have included deploying federal forces and National Guard units in contested contexts; legal experts note that federal and many state laws bar federal personnel from polling places, and courts have been used to block or constrain such deployments when they threaten to intimidate voters or officials [7] [6]. The Brennan Center emphasizes that these legal protections create a strong basis for judicial relief against inappropriate federal presence at polls [7].
4. Information operations and private influence as tools of influence
Non-legal influence also flows through information operations — foreign and domestic — that exploit social media, paid digital advertising and fake accounts to shape public perceptions of election administration, while private philanthropic or corporate funding for election offices or get‑out‑the‑vote work can alter administrative capacities and priorities in ways that raise political and legal questions [4] [5]. Campaign Legal Center and post‑2016 investigations documented systematic digital campaigns aimed at provoking discord and manipulating voter beliefs [4].
5. State resistance: refusals, litigation and legislative safeguards
States have countered by refusing to comply with overbroad federal demands, mounting lawsuits that assert state control over election administration, and enacting statutes to protect election officials and bar certain kinds of private money or federal interference; these moves draw on the Elections Clause and on longstanding state responsibility for voter registration, polling operations and ballot counting [6] [1] [9]. State refusals to hand over voter rolls triggered DOJ suits, which in turn produced coordinated congressional and state-level pushback [1] [8].
6. Institutional and criminal backstops, and why the contest matters
Federal criminal statutes prohibit intimidation, threats and conspiracies to interfere with voting — tools that can be invoked against actors who cross from pressure into criminal interference — but reliance on federal prosecution is uneven, so states and civil litigants remain crucial enforcers of election integrity [10] [7]. The broader struggle over non-legal influence is consequential because it reshapes incentives and the practical ability of local administrators to run elections, meaning that the mix of refusals, litigation, statutory reform and public transparency by states has become the principal check on administrative overreach [6] [9].