While midterm primaries draw lower participation rates than other elections, states have demonstrated a wide range in turnout numbers in 2022. And nearly every state that predominantly relies on voting by mail has outperformed the national midpoint this year.
According to data reported by state governments and analyzed by the National Vote at Home Institute, the medium turnout rate in primaries, as of June 30, is 23.5 percent. Every state that is either all vote-by-mail or reported that at least 75 percent of ballots were returned by mail exceeded the median with one exception.
Montana, where county officials are allowed (but not required) by the state to mail ballots to voters, has the highest primary turnout so far this cycle, at 39 percent. According to NVAHI’s analysis, 89 percent of votes were cast using mailed ballots; 55 percent of people receiving ballots by mail returned them while only 12 percent of people required to use a polling location voted.
Oregon, California, Colorado, the District of Columbia and Nevada are all vote-by-mail states, and all rank among the top 12 in turnout this year. Alaska, which used all-mail voting for a special congressional primary in which all candidates appeared on one ballot, was also in the top dozen.
“The power of vote-at-home elections is clear. Not only does it remove unnecessary barriers to voting, it's proven to boost turnout,” NVAHI Executive Director Lori Augino said in an email announcing the data. “Even in the primary elections that have taken place so far this year, states with strong vote-at-home models are averaging about 10% higher in turnout than states that do not automatically mail ballots to their voters or require an excuse to vote absentee.
Heavily Republican Utah, a vote-by-mail state, reported just 21 percent participation but many GOP nominees were selected earlier at party conventions. And there were no Democratic primaries for federal offices and just a handful at the state level.
Other highlights from the data:
- Oregon, despite conducting a closed primary, had the second highest turnout (37 percent), with more than half of both Democrats and Republicans participating.
- Nebraska (third at 34 percent) has 11 counties that are purely vote-at-home jurisdictions. Those counties averaged 55 percent turnout.
- North Dakota’s 42 counties that conduct elections by mail averaged a 6 percent bump compared to the 11 counties that require people to vote in person.
According to NVAHI, the seven vote-by-mail states plus Montana averaged 31 percent turnout in the primaries. The 13 states that allow anyone to vote by absentee ballot without providing an excuse averaged 23 percent, while the nine states that require an excuse to use an absentee ballot averaged just 18 percent and had six of the seven lowest turnout rates.
Three vote-by-mail states have yet to hold their midterm primaries: Hawaii (Aug. 13), Vermont (Aug. 9) and Washington (Aug. 2)
NVAHI collected data from state websites following the primaries. The results from June may be adjusted when the data is finalized.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.