FACT FOCUS: The Trump administration is falsely claiming Jimmy Carter was against mail-in voting

The Trump administration has drawn criticism for mischaracterizing former President Jimmy Carter’s stance on mail-in voting while advocating for stricter federal voting legislation. At the Republican Members Issues Conference on Monday and during a White House press briefing the following day, both President Donald Trump and press secretary Karoline Leavitt cited a 2005 bipartisan report co-chaired by Carter to claim the former president opposed mail-in and absentee ballots.

During his remarks, Trump claimed, “Jimmy Carter, the best thing he ever did, he headed a commission after he was president… And he did a thing on mail-in ballots. He said mail-in ballots should not be allowed because they are inherently dishonest.” Leavitt echoed this sentiment, quoting from the 2005 Commission on Federal Election Reform report that “absentee ballots remain the largest source of potential voter fraud.”

However, these statements significantly misrepresent Carter’s actual position and the report’s conclusions. Jason Carter, the former president’s grandson and chair of The Carter Center’s board of trustees, issued a clear rebuttal: “My grandfather supported mail-in voting — so much so that he used it himself. Any claim to the contrary unnecessarily sows doubt in election integrity and undermines voter confidence in a consequential election year.”

The Carter Center also released a statement this week confirming that “the administration’s claims about President Carter’s views on mail-in voting are not true,” adding that these assertions fail to “consider the rest of the report’s findings or President Carter’s acknowledgment of the safeguards that have emerged in the 20+ years since this report came out.”

Carter’s public comments consistently supported mail-in voting throughout his later years. In May 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, he urged political leaders to “expand vote-by-mail and other measures to help protect the core of American democracy — the right of our citizens to vote.” Later that year, Carter explicitly stated, “I approve the use of absentee ballots and have been using them for more than five years.”

The 2005 report in question, titled “Building Confidence in U.S. Elections,” was produced by the Commission on Federal Election Reform, co-chaired by Carter and former Secretary of State James Baker. While the report did identify absentee ballots as a potential source of fraud, it did not advocate eliminating them. Instead, it offered recommendations to reduce fraud risks, such as restricting who could handle ballots, prohibiting candidates from collecting them, and enacting legislation to minimize fraud from paid voter registration efforts.

Far from discouraging mail-in voting, the report actually noted that in Oregon, which had implemented vote-by-mail seven years prior, there was “little evidence of fraud.” It also recommended further research on the benefits and drawbacks of mail-in and early voting systems.

Experts emphasize that mail-in voting has evolved significantly since 2005. “Mail voting has become more common and more mature. Over that period of time, states have learned from each other — best practices for not only avoiding fraud, but just generally administering mail balloting well,” explained Mark Lindeman, policy and strategy director at Verified Voting, a nonpartisan election technology organization.

These improvements include ballot tracking systems, processes for curing rejected ballots, and better methods for identifying duplicate registrations. Despite the increased use of mail-in voting—from roughly 13% of ballots in 2004 to nearly a third in recent elections—experts confirm there is no evidence of widespread fraud.

Interestingly, Trump himself has used mail-in voting in Florida, and approximately 30% of voters cast mailed ballots during the 2024 election that returned him to office. Three of the four states with increased mail-in ballot usage since 2020—Indiana, South Dakota, and Utah—are Republican-controlled.

When questioned about the apparent contradiction, White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson defended the president’s statements, saying, “President Trump and Karoline are completely right,” adding that Carter’s 2020 endorsement of mail-in voting “does not invalidate the findings” of the 2005 report.

This controversy emerges as the administration pushes for the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, which would implement stricter proof-of-citizenship and photo ID requirements for voting ahead of the upcoming midterm elections.