Our Republican Legacy (ORL) Policy Statement on President Trump’s Call for Republicans to Nationalize Elections

The issue. On February 2, 2026, President Donald Trump advocated that elected Republicans should “nationalize” the 2026 elections, which explicitly violates the Constitution and abandons the core Republican principle of federalism. ORL emphatically opposes this suggestion.

In his Inaugural address, Ronald Reagan enunciated a core Republican principle: “The federal government did not create the states; the states created the federal government.” He also repeatedly said that the “government closest to the people serves the people best.” This is especially true in the case of elections, which is why the Founders drafted the Constitution’s election clause, Article 1, Section 4, clause 1, which states: “The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing [choosing] Senators.”

In an interview with his former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino, Trump stated: “The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over — we should take over the voting — the voting in at least many, 15 places, The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.” 

The President then went on to repeat his “big lie” that he won the 2020 Presidential election, which he knew was false. In turn, his lie resulted in the January 6, 2021, debacle, in which he encouraged his ardent supporters to march on the Capitol and “fight like hell” in a final, aborted attempt to get Congress to overturn the election results in his favor. For his actions, the House of Representatives impeached Donald Trump, accusing him of inciting the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

The day after the Bongino interview, February 3, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Republican from South Dakota, quickly rejected Trump’s statement that Republicans should take over state elections, noting correctly that the Constitution reserves that power to the states.

At watershed times in our history, Congress has passed laws affecting voting when some States were systematically denying the vote to thousands of their residents. The Civil Rights Act of 1960 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 are prime examples of efforts to protect voting rights nationwide by eliminating racial discrimination, enforcing court-ordered desegregation, and securing individuals’ constitutionally protected right to vote. The evidence of racial discrimination was overwhelming, and it justified federal intervention.

When signing the Civil Rights Act of 1960, President Dwight Eisenhower’s statement set a bar for when federal intervention relative to states’ rights was warranted. He declared: “The new Act also deals significantly with that key constitutional right of every American, the right to vote without discrimination on account of race or color. . . . the new law will play an important role in the days ahead in attaining our goal of equality under law in all areas of our country for all Americans.”

Investigations into President Trump’s accusations of voting fraud and irregularities have turned up negligible evidence of fraud and certainly nothing that would affect the outcome of the election. It does not come close to justifying federal intervention in the constitutionally protected status of states and localities to determine the time, place and manner of elections.

President Trump has taken other recent actions to assert and extend his executive power through federal creep into the state-based election process, thereby continuing to probe and test not only the Constitution but also the public reaction to his power grabs. For example, following the horrific and fatal shootings of U.S. citizens Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti by masked ICE /Border Patrol federal agents in Minneapolis operating under various Executive Orders on immigration by President Trump, Attorney General Pam Bondi wrote Minnesota Governor Tim Walz a letter on January 25, 2026. She said they “could bring an end to the chaos” there if, among other unrelated things, he turned over his state’s voter rolls with voters’ personal information to the Department of Justice for subsequent use by the Trump Administration to pursue its political agenda before the midterm elections.

Then, on January 28, 2026, FBI agents, acting under a dubious federal search warrant and accompanied inexplicably by Trump’s Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, searched and seized the 2020 election records of Fulton County, Georgia, in another futile effort to try to prove that President Trump won the 2020 Presidential election in Georgia. President Trump lost that election. It has been proven on three separate occasions by Georgia: his claims are false and unfounded. Gabbard apparently has been tasked with pursuing unfounded, false conspiracy theories alleging foreign interference in the 2020 election. The President’s Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency certified the security and validity of the 2020 elections.

Recall that on January 2, 2021, four days before he encouraged his supporters to disrupt the lawful election of his successor  on January 6 at the U.S. Capitol, President Trump called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, in a desperate last plea for him to change Georgia’s votes: “I just need 11,870 votes.” To his credit, Raffensperger followed the law and did not bend to Trump’s electoral request and political intimidation.

ORL policy position. Our Republican Legacy’s foundational principle is respect for the Constitution, the Rule of Law, and all the guardrails that exist in law to protect our rights and freedoms.

We support the position of Senate Majority Leader Thune that Republicans should reject President Trump’s public call to nationalize elections in fifteen states and, instead, continue to support and defend the Constitution’s election clause and the primacy of state legislatures over their state’s elections.

We oppose all attempts by this Administration to push the federal government to meddle in state and local elections, regardless of whether the President attempts to do so by securing more federal search warrants (Georgia) – as questionable as they may be – or by outright executive branch intimidation and coercion directed by the White House through various departments of the federal government (Minnesota). States are not agents of the national government in our federal system with respect to conducting free and fair elections.

ORL recommended actions. Consistent with ORL’s principle and existing policy statement on the Constitution and the Rule of Law, ORL:

1. Urges President Trump to immediately renounce his recent statement, and cease and desist from any further federal attempts to meddle in the midterm elections or any future elections: and

2. Recommends Congress remains vigilant and opposes any initiative or action – legislative or administrative – by this Administration to nationalize elections in any state in violation of the Constitution.