A Proposal for Bipartisan Federal Election Reform

July has been a consequential month for federal election policy, with both parties introducing their flagship reform proposals. House Administration Committee Chair Bryan Steil (R-WI) reintroduced the American Confidence in Elections Act (ACE Act), first introduced by Rodney Davis (R-IL) last year. Weeks later, Sens. Bennet (D-CO), Hickenlooper (D-CO), and Klobuchar (D-Minn) reintroduced the Freedom to Vote Act (FTVA). With divided government and razor-thin majorities, neither bill stands a chance of becoming law without bipartisan support. Instead, the bills signal which policies are most important to each party, and their priorities are not as far apart as they might seem.

We identified reforms that would strengthen election infrastructure, bolster public trust, and have the support of BPC’s bipartisan election official task force.  We paired each party’s priorities together to show what a bipartisan piece of federal legislation could look like.

In addition to requirements that would impact all 50 states, the ACE Act exercises Congress’ authority over the District of Columbia to mandate a series of reforms to DC elections alone. Sponsors of the ACE Act explain that, in doing so, they hope DC to “serve as an example to the states of effective election administration.” For the purposes of this analysis, we consider the prescribed changes to DC elections as an indicator of Republican election policy priorities.

There are four key areas where Democratic and Republican policy priorities from ACE and FTVA could be paired together to create lasting reforms that expand access while hardening security: casting a ballot, voter registration, voter identification, and certification. These areas are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to commonsense election policy, but they show what could be accomplished if both parties worked together.

Good election policy lives at the intersection of security and access, transparency and accountability. Yet we acknowledge that the prospect of reform before the 2024 election is not only unlikely but ill-advised: election officials need time and resources to implement major changes. As the 2024 presidential election campaign season gets underway, Congress must focus on helping election officials carry out policies already in place. The best thing they can do to support elections right now is to provide consistent, reliable funding for state and local election administration.

This explainer is an exploration of post-2024 bipartisan policy opportunities and is not an exhaustive proposal for what federal reform should or could look like.

1. Casting a Ballot: Voter Access Meets Election Security

FTVA requires states to offer no-excuse absentee voting and 14 days of early in-person voting prior to federal elections.

The ACE Act requires that the DC Board of Elections verify signatures on mail ballots and that only ballots in-hand by the close of polls be counted.

Compromise: Security and access are not mutually exclusive. A bipartisan compromise might keep the FTVA’s requirement for no-excuse mail voting and shorten the early in-person voting requirement to a floor of seven days, rather than 14. This minimum standard for ballot access could be paired with the ACE Act’s signature verification requirement, plus a requirement that ballots be in-hand by the close of polls to be counted.

Each of these policies has been endorsed by BPC’s bipartisan task force of election officials. This compromise would ensure voters have access to the ballot while preventing expending limited resources on periods of early voting periods longer than voters in most jurisdictions would fully utilize. It would also formalize signature verification, a practice already used by the majority of states, and considered the gold standard for remote voter identity verification. Finally, requiring that mail ballots be in-hand by the close of polls expedites unofficial results reporting, a critical component to rebuilding voters’ trust in elections.

2. Expanded Voter Registration Plus Bolstered List Maintenance

FTVA requires states to implement automatic, online, and same-day voter registration.

The ACE Act would prohibit same-day voter registration and require annual list maintenance in DC. It would also bolster all states’ list maintenance reporting requirements.

Compromise: Same-day voter registration is politically charged and can be challenging to implement quickly. Congress could leave up to states whether to conduct same-day registration while incentivizing automatic and online voter registration (both of which promote cleaner voter rolls) and standardizing list maintenance procedures and reporting.

List maintenance is complex and contentious. This is for good reason: determining who is and who is not eligible to vote should be carefully considered and impartial to partisan interests. Automatic and online voter registration is currently utilized by 22 and 42 states, respectively. Both processes streamline voter registration and limit the likelihood of human error, promoting both enfranchisement and security. Pairing expanded registration opportunities with standards for list maintenance and increased reporting around states’ list maintenance efforts bolsters transparency while alleviating concerns that such activities are politically motivated.

3. Set Standard for Voter ID and Secure Provisional Ballot Access

FTVA creates national standards for states that require voters to provide identification to vote. This includes detailing a list of allowed alternatives to photographic identification, such as a utility bill, and ensuring voters without valid identification can still cast a provisional ballot. Provisional ballots are a failsafe measure that ensure voters whose eligibility cannot be determined at the time of voting can still cast a ballot; they are only counted once the voter’s eligibility is confirmed.

The ACE Act would establish photographic ID requirements within DC and expresses the sense of Congress that “Photographic voter identification is important for ensuring voter confidence in election processes and outcomes.”

Compromise: The FTVA’s provisions only apply to states that currently require identification to vote, and the ACE Act’s requirement for DC risks excluding voters without photographic identification. A bipartisan compromise might involve requiring all states to require some form of ID, while ensuring those requirements are not overly restrictive. A national standard for voter ID could be balanced by requiring states to accept non-photographic alternatives, such as a utility bill, and codifying protections for provisional ballot access.

4. Protecting Certification and Enshrining Pre-Certification Audits

FTVA would make intimidation of ballot tabulation, canvassing, and certification efforts a federal crime.

The ACE Act would require DC to “conduct and publish an audit of the effectiveness and accuracy of the voting systems, nonvoting election technology, election procedures, and outcomes.”  It would also prohibit anyone from within the DC Board of Elections from conducting the prescribed audits.

Compromise: Both audits and smooth certification are essential ingredients to trusted election results that culminate in a peaceful transfer of power. Protections on certification can be seamlessly paired with pre-certification tabulation audits to ensure that results are both accurate and widely accepted.

BPC recommends that professional auditors and statisticians be involved in setting standard operating procedures for the conduct of election audits, but that election officials be the ones to conduct the audit itself to meet chain of custody and records retention requirements detailed in existing federal law. Additionally, while BPC supports audits of election procedures (otherwise known as performance or process audits), it is unreasonable to require those to be conducted prior to certification. Limiting the audit requirement to pre-certification tabulation audits sets a reasonable floor for audit procedures.

Additionally, while FTVA makes intimidation of critical certification activities a federal crime, this reform would not impact broader threats to election certification (namely, when local, county, or state officials fail to certify valid results without cause). As such, alternative certification protections that incentivize states to codify certification timelines and penalties for failing to meet them should be explored in future legislation.

Looking Ahead: The Urgency of Federal Support

While the prospect of bipartisan cooperation on election administration policy may seem like a pipe dream, it doesn’t have to be. Federal election reform has a long history of bipartisanship: the Electoral Count Reform Act of 2022, the Help America Vote Act of 2002, and the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 all passed with votes from both sides of the aisle.

In January of 2022, BPC led a bipartisan group of think tanks to release Prioritizing Achievable Federal Election Reform, which paired Republican and Democratic policy priorities together in an incentive-based framework where states meeting minimum standards set by Congress qualify for federal election funding. BPC recommends this template to balance concerns around federal overreach with the need for federal support against sophisticated threats.