Election officials of both parties rush to denounce Trump’s lies, defend voting systems

Floating ballots, foreign interference, faulty tabulation.

President Donald Trump unleashed a barrage of unfounded claims in his prime-time speech Thursday. 

But since then, election officials across the country have rushed to refute the lies and defend their states’ election systems.

Officials and administrators from at least 30 states debunked the president’s claims over the weekend. Some are in the heat of elections while others attempt to quell voter concerns in the lead-up to the midterms.

“Hundreds of thousands” of ineligible voters

In addressing one of Trump’s top concerns — that voter rolls are wrought with inaccurate data that breeds fraud — election officials reassured voters that registration removals are routine to ensure rolls remain accurate after residents die or move out of the county. 

Georgia has been a focus of Trump’s election attacks for years. Gabriel Sterling, Georgia’s Republican election director, went on NPR over the weekend to set the record straight.

Trump claimed there were “hundreds of thousands” of noncitizens active on voter rolls. Georgia’s audit, the first state to do one for the 2026 election according to Sterling, found only one noncitizen registered to vote.

Georgia was previously one of a few dozen states that agreed to turn over sensitive voter information for the federal Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) database. However, a federal judge has since blocked this participation while litigation remains ongoing.

Idaho was another state that complied with the Department of Homeland Security’s request for voter data. The office of Idaho Secretary of State Phil McGrane (R) said DHS’ finding of 4,000 names of those who are now dead is not out of the ordinary and that the state conducts purges for recently deceased citizens regularly.

Election officials from multiple counties in Florida also responded to questions about voter roll accuracy over the weekend. 

“Somebody who should not be on the rolls is taken off as soon as we learn about it,” Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Wendy Sartory Link (D) told local public media reporters.

Foreign interference and voting machines

One of Trump’s biggest claims of the night was that China tried to rig the 2020 election, claiming that the country made voter rolls public in 18 states. Trump described it as “the largest compromise of election data in history.”

That claim is false and misleading.

“Everyone has this data,” said one of the nation’s leading election experts, David Becker. Election chiefs spoke out to reiterate Becker’s statement.

“The voter data file is everywhere,” said Connecticut Secretary of State Stephanie Thomas (D), adding that her state has one of the strongest cybersecurity defenses, including a paper trail for voting machines.

A spokesperson for the Loudoun County Office of Elections in Virginia also emphasized voting machine security, adding that the state’s ballot counting devices are not connected to the internet, making it impossible for sensitive data to be accessed online.

And in Maryland, all votes are cast via paper ballot. As a result, no voting machines are involved in the process at all.

Floating ballots

Trump also took a jab at mail-in voting in his speech, claiming absentee ballots were “floating aimlessly in the mail.”

“No, ballots are not aimlessly floating out there,” said Charlotte County, Florida Supervisor of Elections Leah Valenti, a Republican and an appointee of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R). 

The president also called out California’s elections as “inherently corrupt.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) spoke out on social media to defend his state’s widespread use of mail ballots as safe and secure, in addition to multiple election officials. 

“I have the utmost confidence in the San Diego Registrar of Voters procedures in place,” said Shawn Brom. “That includes the vote-by-mail ballots and also in-person voting.”