In the 13 years since Utah first allowed counties to conduct elections entirely by mail, voter participation has gone up, Utah elections have been consistently secure and voters have widely embraced the practice.
But President Donald Trump, with the support of Sen. Mike Lee, wants mail-in voting to come to an end nationwide.
For years, Utah was one of several states — mostly in the sprawling American West — to champion vote by mail, and the only solid red state in the group. An analysis by The Salt Lake Tribune last year found that among the 26 counties that provided voting method data for the 2024 primary election, 96.7% of Utahns who voted used the ballot sent to their mailbox.
But during the most recent legislative session, state lawmakers chose to move away from the state’s system of sending all active, registered voters a ballot in the mail. Starting in 2029 — after a midterm election, contests that have historically been difficult for the party in power — voters will have to opt in once every eight years if they want to vote by mail.
And now, the popular voting method is facing another attack, with Trump’s announcement that he wants to end mail-in voting across the country — a plan for which Lee, Utah’s senior federal delegate, offered his backing.
Trump announced his intention to end the practice of mail-in voting in a post on social media Monday, writing, “I am going to lead a movement to get rid of MAIL-IN BALLOTS, and also, while we’re at it, Highly ‘Inaccurate,’ Very Expensive, and Seriously Controversial VOTING MACHINES.”
The president went on to write that he would instead support the use of “watermark paper” and said, incorrectly, that the United States was the only country that uses mail-in voting, alleging, falsely, that all other countries have given up the practice because of voter fraud.
States, Trump wrote, “are merely an ‘agent’ for the Federal Government in counting and tabulating the votes. They must do what the Federal Government, as represented by the President of the United States, tells them, FOR THE GOOD OF OUR COUNTRY, to do.”
“ELECTIONS CAN NEVER BE HONEST WITH MAIL IN BALLOTS/VOTING,” he added. “I, AND THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, WILL FIGHT LIKE HELL TO BRING HONESTY AND INTEGRITY BACK TO OUR ELECTIONS. THE MAIL-IN BALLOT HOAX, USING VOTING MACHINES THAT ARE A COMPLETE AND TOTAL DISASTER, MUST END, NOW!!!”
(Evan Vucci | AP) Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump talks during a roundtable with faith leaders as Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, listens Sunday, Oct. 13, 2024, in Prescott Valley. Ariz.
Lee shared Trump’s post on X Monday and wrote, “Easy to vote, hard to cheat.”
Lee’s office did not respond to a request for comment from The Tribune, but in a statement to the Deseret News, Lee reiterated that he stands with Trump on the issue.
“The President is correct that universal mail-in voting is rife with opportunities for interference, errors, and fraud,” Lee reportedly said. “We can restore public confidence in election integrity by only allowing mail-in ballots in special cases — such as overseas service members and their families — and requiring most people to show up in person on Election Day with proof of identity and citizenship.”
Lee has made election “security” a legislative priority in recent years, sponsoring the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act, which would require voters to provide evidence of citizenship when registering to vote or updating their voter registration. Election experts have said the bill perpetuates misinformation about the security of U.S. elections and could make it harder for many citizens to vote.
On Saturday, two days before Trump’s announcement about his “movement” to end mail-in voting, Lee posted two AI-generated videos on X of people casting ballots and wrote, “Raise your hand if you’d prefer that we cast paper ballots in person, on Election Day, with photo ID—all after proving citizenship when registering?”
He added, “#PassTheSAVEAct.”
In a statement shared with The Tribune Tuesday, Rep. Blake Moore, who represents Utah’s 1st Congressional District and serves in House Republican leadership, said he supported election security efforts like the SAVE Act, but that he felt election systems should be determined by the states.
“I’ve been clear that election laws should remain primarily at the state level,” Moore said in the statement. “Utah’s system is a strong example; our officials have done excellent work to protect election integrity and remain committed to making improvements.”
The rest of Utah’s federal delegation, including Sen. John Curtis and Reps. Mike Kennedy, Celeste Maloy and Burgess Owens did not respond when asked whether they supported Trump’s apparent effort to end vote by mail.
Prior to his election to Congress, Kennedy, while serving as a state senator, sponsored a bill that would have given county officials the ability to opt out of a primarily by-mail election in favor of a primarily in-person one, forcing voters to notify election officials if they wanted a ballot in the mail. The bill did not make it out of a standing committee for consideration by the larger Senate.
In Republican-led Utah, voting by mail has proven to boost participation across the political spectrum, and especially improves numbers in nonpartisan municipal races. It’s made voting easier for many Utahns with disabilities, and has been a step forward for Native American communities in the state who have had to surmount numerous barriers to realize their right to vote.
Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson, who oversees elections in Utah, pushed back on any federal attempts to interfere with state election policies in a statement Monday.
“The constitutional right of individual states to choose the manner in which they conduct secure elections is a fundamental strength of our system,” she wrote in a post on X.
One of the most influential conservative groups in the country, the Heritage Foundation, urged federal scrutiny of state and local election officials in its blueprint for a future Trump administration known as “Project 2025,” which was published in 2023 and endorsed by Lee. It also drove the push for Utah to abandon voting by mail entirely earlier this year.
Last month, as part of a sweeping assessment of state voting systems, Trump’s Justice Department asked that Utah hand over the entirety of its voter data — a request that Henderson resisted.
“We’ve offered the public voter list. If they want protected data, there’s a process for government entities to request it for lawful purposes,” Henderson, Utah’s top election official, said in a statement to The Tribune.
“We’ll address that if it comes,” she continued, “but so far we haven’t identified any federal or state statute that would justify handing over to the federal government the personal identifying information of 2.1 million Utah voters.”