Ballotpedia is keeping a close eye on ballot measures across the country as we head towards November 8th. Managing Editor for the Ballot Measures Team, Ryan Byrne, and staff writer, Victoria Rose, are digging into ballot measure trends that have been identified this year across a myriad of topics including abortion, marijuana, voting policy, and more.
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After October 7, Israeli volunteers became the state’s largest operating division. Here’s what that civic model can teach angry, distrustful Americans.
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When Citizens Stop Waiting
Oct 26, 2026
Jordan Karp wrote recently in these pages about anger at Washington, and the piece has stayed with me, less for the anger itself than for the level underneath it: the quiet, unglamorous work that happens when citizens stop waiting for national institutions to function. I have spent three years watching that level operate at national scale. Israel's war years produced a case study in what citizens can build when they conclude, reasonably, that no one else is coming, and some of it travels directly to the American moment Karp describes.
The Vacuum and the Volunteers
Within days of October 7, the Israeli state, like every state struck that hard, was overwhelmed: evacuated towns to house, farmers without Thai workers, reservists' families without income, a flood of needs no ministry was built to absorb. What filled the gap was not spontaneous kindness alone but something more interesting: organized citizens. Reporting on the period describes volunteer organizations stepping into the space between need and state capacity, neighbors delivering care to neighbors at a scale the formal system could not reach. WhatsApp groups became logistics networks. Synagogue bulletins became supply chains. The country's world-famous tech sector bent its tools to the task, and its ordinary citizens bent their schedules, and for a period the volunteer layer was, functionally, the state's largest operating division.
How the Committee Layer Worked
The part that matters for readers thinking about trust is not the heroics but the structure. In town after town, the arrangements that worked shared a shape: a hyper-local unit, a defined task, a named person responsible, and a feedback loop short enough to correct mistakes within days. The arrangements that failed were the ones that waited for permission or funding from above. It turns out that trust, which everyone agrees has collapsed, is not rebuilt by trust-building exercises. It is rebuilt by task-sharing: two people who disagree about politics discovering, over crates of donated diapers, that they can rely on each other completely. The committee layer did more for Israeli social cohesion in two years than a decade of formal dialogue programs, and it did it as a byproduct of getting things done.
A Lesson for the Angry
Karp's anger at Washington is aimed at institutions that seem unfixable, and I hold no brief for anyone's capital. But the Israeli experience suggests the productive question is not how to fix the institutions first. It is what concrete, local, cooperative task an angry citizen can join this month. American civic life already has the scaffolding: mutual aid networks, volunteer fire departments, library boards, the whole unglamorous apparatus of self-government. What the war years taught us, at terrible tuition, is that the appetite for shared work is enormous and mostly dormant, and that it wakes fastest when someone names a task small enough to start and real enough to matter.
The anger Karp describes is energy. Energy, unorganized, curdles into cynicism; organized, it becomes the committee layer. The volunteers I worked beside these years would not recognize themselves in the word politics at all. They would recognize a town that needed them and a table with a task on it. That table is set in every town in America too.
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Latino Voters Shift Ahead of Midterm Elections
Oct 26, 2026
Two years after providing historic levels of support that helped propel Donald Trump back to the White House, Latino voters are shifting rapidly away from the Republican Party. The realignment is driven by a potent combination of persistent economic anxieties and a sharp backlash against the administration’s aggressive domestic immigration crackdowns. A landmark national poll conducted by NBC News and Telemundo reveals that the President’s approval rating among registered Latino voters has plummeted to just 27%, signaling deep political turbulence for the GOP on the eve of critical midterm elections.
When asked by reporters outside the White House about the plunging numbers, President Trump angrily dismissed the data, labeling the findings as “fake news.”
Meanwhile, a spokesperson from the Department of Homeland Security formally defended the sweeping enforcement measures, stating that the agency’s actions are simply “fulfilling Trump’s promises and enforcing laws passed by Congress.”
The dramatic shift presents a major opportunity for Democrats to capitalize on key races in states and districts boasting significant Hispanic populations. In 2024, exit polls indicated that Trump secured roughly 46% of the Latino vote nationwide. Today, that base of support appears to be fracturing. Data collected by Equis Research underscores the trend, noting that support for Republican candidates among Hispanics who voted for Trump in 2024 has dropped 10 percentage points over the last year. Roughly 22% of Latino Trump voters indicate they do not plan to back Republicans in the upcoming midterms.
While pocketbook issues like inflation and the cost of living remain primary drivers for voters, the administration’s sweeping approach to immigration has created a profound and visceral fracture. An overwhelming two-thirds of Latino voters state that the administration’s enforcement policies have gone “too far”. Although 83% of respondents still support the targeted deportation of undocumented immigrants convicted of serious criminal records, general approval of broad interior operations remains low. Only 30% of Latinos approve of the administration’s overall handling of immigration, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) faces a staggering 65% negative favorability rating within the community.
The polling data emphasizes that immigration enforcement has moved from a theoretical policy debate into the daily lives of families. Nearly one-third of Latino voters—31%—report that they or a loved one have started carrying legal identification at all times out of fear of being swept up in ICE operations. Furthermore, 27% know someone who has been detained or deported over the last two years. The climate of fear has reached a point where 17% of respondents admit that they or close acquaintances have actively considered avoiding in-person voting tables out of apprehension regarding federal enforcement visibility.
This sense of overreach is creating severe legislative headwinds for local Republican incumbents representing heavily Hispanic areas. In Florida, Republican Congresswoman María Elvira Salazar, who represents a majority-Latino district in Miami, broke publicly with the White House on immigration strategy. In a widely circulated campaign video, Salazar warned that Hispanic voters who supported the administration in 2024 are feeling deeply betrayed by the broad nature of the interior crackdowns, transforming previously safe seats into intense battlegrounds.
- YouTube youtu.be
As political strategists analyze the shifting maps, the data indicates that Democrats have reclaimed significant margins on traditional battleground metrics. The NBC News/Telemundo survey reveals that Latino voters now favor Democratic congressional candidates over Republicans by a wide margin.
“This has been a key question coming into this midterm campaign… one of the reasons Trump was returned to the White House was surprisingly strong support from Latino voters in 2024,” Kornacki explained. Analyzing the new polling, he noted, “He basically battled [the Democrats] to a draw with Latino voters then—which for a Republican, that’s a very strong performance. But… he barely has a quarter approval rating.”
Crucially, the trust gap has widened on the economy as well, with 54% of Latino voters trusting the Democratic Party compared to just 33% who favor the GOP—wiping away the significant economic advantage Republicans held with this demographic during the 2024 cycle. With billions of dollars in advertising saturating the airwaves, the rapid movement of the Latino electorate suggests that the administration’s border strategy has sparked an electoral counterweight that could fundamentally reshape control of Congress.
Latino Voters Shift Ahead of Midterm Elections was first published in Latino News Network and is republished with permission.
The Latino News Network (LNN) is an independent, English-language multimedia news platform dedicated entirely to covering and serving the Hispanic-Latino community in the United States.
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Who Gave the Federal Government the Right to Decide Who Can Vote?
Oct 25, 2026
The Trump administration is pressing to remove noncitizens from voter rolls across the country. Yet an important question seems to be missing from the debate: Where, exactly, does the federal government get the authority to impose a citizenship requirement on federal elections? The Constitution does not make citizenship a universal qualification for voting. Instead, Article I, Section 2, Clause 1 states: “The Electors in each State shall have the Qualifications requisite for Electors of the most numerous Branch of the State Legislature.” At the same time, Article I, Section 4, Clause 1 explicitly grants Congress authority over the conduct of federal elections: “The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.” In Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona, Inc. (2013), the U.S. Supreme Court distinguished Congress’s power to regulate how federal elections are conducted from the states’ authority to determine voter qualifications, explaining that Congress may regulate the “Times, Places and Manner” of elections, “but not who may vote in them.” For much of American history, noncitizens voted in elections in at least 22 states and territories, and some historical research suggests the number may have been as high as 40. Today, certain noncitizens are still permitted to vote in local elections in California, Maryland, Vermont and the District of Columbia. If the Constitution leaves voter qualifications to the states, what gives the federal government the authority to demand otherwise?
A Long History of State Decisions
Noncitizen voting is not a recent idea or an unprecedented departure from American practice. From the colonial period through the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, many states and territories permitted at least some noncitizens to vote. The rules varied considerably. Some jurisdictions allowed immigrants who had declared their intention to become U.S. citizens to vote, while others adopted broader rules for eligible residents. Because voter qualifications for federal elections generally followed those established for elections to a state's legislature, these state decisions also permitted noncitizens to vote in elections for members of Congress and, in some states, presidential electors.
Over time, states reconsidered these policies. Rising nativism, wartime hostility toward immigrants and concerns about election practices contributed to the gradual elimination of noncitizen voting. The 1924 presidential election was the last in which noncitizens legally voted for president in states that still permitted the practice. Arkansas, the last state to retain noncitizen voting, ended it in 1926. By then, citizenship had become a voting requirement in every state.
The significance of this history is not that states must allow noncitizens to vote today. It is that the change occurred through state action. State governments gradually decided to restrict voting to citizens, and the practice disappeared as those states changed their laws. The historical record therefore provides an important context for examining what happened when Congress later enacted a nationwide prohibition.
The Federal Government Enters the Picture
The history of noncitizen voting took a significant turn in 1996, when Congress enacted a broad immigration-enforcement law. The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 addressed a wide range of immigration issues, from border enforcement to deportation procedures. Among its many provisions was Section 216, which added Section 611 to Title 18 of the U.S. Code. Although the provision received little separate attention in the legislative record, it imposed a nationwide federal criminal prohibition on noncitizen voting in federal elections.
Section 611, now codified at 18 U.S.C. § 611, makes it unlawful for noncitizens to vote for president, presidential electors, U.S. senators, U.S. representatives and certain other federal offices, subject to limited exceptions. By 1996, state action had already ended noncitizen voting in federal elections decades earlier. Congress did not simply follow a new wave of state decisions. It established a nationwide federal criminal prohibition on an issue that, under the constitutional framework described above, raises a fundamental question about the division of authority between the states and the federal government.
Does the Constitution Give Congress That Authority?
Article I, Section 2 and the Seventeenth Amendment establish that voter qualifications for elections to the House of Representatives and the Senate follow those required for electors of the most numerous branch of each state's legislature. Article II, Section 1, Clause 2 separately provides that each state appoints its presidential electors in the manner its legislature directs. These provisions leave the states with significant responsibility for determining voter qualifications.
The Supreme Court's reasoning in Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona, Inc. reinforces the distinction between Congress's power to regulate election procedures and the states' authority to determine who is qualified to vote. The Court explained that Congress's Elections Clause authority concerns how federal elections are held, “but not who may vote in them.” The case concerned Arizona's proof-of-citizenship requirement for voter registration; it did not decide the constitutionality of Section 611. Nevertheless, its explanation of the constitutional division of authority is directly relevant to the question raised here.
Congress has substantial constitutional powers, including authority over naturalization and the regulation of federal elections. But the existence of those powers does not automatically establish that Congress may impose a uniform citizenship qualification on voters in elections administered by the states. A law regulating registration procedures, ballot handling or election administration is not necessarily the same as a law defining who is eligible to vote.
There is also relevant precedent that deserves consideration. In Oregon v. Mitchell (1970), the Supreme Court considered congressional authority to set voting-age rules for federal elections, and the justices disagreed about the scope of that authority. The decision illustrates the complexity of the relationship between federal power and state control of voter qualifications. It does not, however, resolve the specific question of whether Congress may criminalize noncitizen voting through Section 611.
My argument is that Section 611 crosses a constitutional boundary. The Constitution expressly gives Congress authority to regulate the conduct of federal elections, while its provisions governing voter qualifications assign a central role to the states. If Congress can establish a voter qualification simply by attaching a federal criminal penalty to it, the distinction between regulating elections and deciding who may vote becomes difficult to maintain.
Citizenship may be a widely accepted qualification for voting today. But the popularity or soundness of a policy does not, by itself, answer the constitutional question of which level of government has the authority to impose it. The question is not whether states may decide that only citizens should vote. The question is whether Congress has the constitutional authority to impose that rule nationally through Section 611.
A Constitutional Question Now Before the Courts
This issue is no longer merely theoretical. The Trump administration has sought to use federal databases to identify noncitizens on voter rolls, prompting legal challenges over federal authority, voter privacy, the accuracy of citizenship-verification systems and the role of states in administering elections. These disputes raise related questions about federal involvement in election administration, but they should not be confused with the separate question of whether Section 611 itself is constitutional.
Several recent federal prosecutions have directly challenged Section 611. According to a September 15, 2026, Reuters report, defendants in cases in Miami, Florida, and Madison, Wisconsin, argued that the 1996 law exceeds Congress's constitutional authority because voter qualifications are reserved to the states.
On October 1, U.S. District Judge David Leibowitz dismissed the case against Chelsea Cox, ruling that Section 611 was unconstitutional. His ruling applies to that case and is not binding on other judges. In a separate Miami prosecution, Judge Jacqueline Becerra rejected Wilner Renaud's constitutional challenge on September 9. These proceedings have produced differing judicial responses, demonstrating that the constitutional question remains contested. The Supreme Court has not issued a definitive decision resolving the constitutionality of Section 611 itself.
These cases matter because they address the central issue directly: whether Congress has the authority to impose a nationwide criminal prohibition on noncitizen voting in federal elections. The courts must consider not only the government's objectives but also the constitutional limits on its power.
Who Deserves a Voice in the Community?
Beyond the constitutional question lies a broader democratic principle: What does it mean for people to have a voice in the communities they share?
Benjamin Franklin once wrote, “They who have no voice nor vote in the electing of representatives do not enjoy liberty.” Political scientist Ron Hayduk has made a related argument for noncitizen voting, writing that extending the right to vote to noncitizens would help make government representative, responsive and accountable.
Noncitizens who live in our communities are subject to local laws and decisions, contribute to their communities and often pay taxes. Allowing eligible noncitizens to vote in certain local elections can recognize their stake in the community and give them a voice in decisions affecting their daily lives. It does not make them citizens; it recognizes that people who are governed by a community have a legitimate interest in how that community is governed.
I believe Section 611 will ultimately be declared unconstitutional, creating an opportunity for each state to decide whether noncitizens should be permitted to vote and, if so, in which elections, subject to the Constitution and other applicable laws. This should not be a source of division. Instead, it offers an opportunity for people across the political spectrum to come together, discuss who should have a voice in the communities they share, and consider how our democratic institutions can better serve everyone.
We may disagree about where to draw the boundaries of voting rights, but we can share a commitment to a democracy that listens, includes and brings people together. This is an opportunity not simply to reconsider who can vote, but to strengthen our democracy by making it work for everybody.
Michael A. Soderstrand is a retired professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and currently lives in Columbus, Ohio.
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The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact Federalism at Its Best
Oct 25, 2026
Federalism operates at its peak when states collaborate as a unified network rather than acting as isolated silos. While the American system traditionally views states as competitive "laboratories of democracy," pure isolationism limits policy success. When states pool resources, align regulations, and share data, they solve national problems faster without expanding federal bureaucracy.
The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC) represents federalism at its best by using explicit constitutional state powers to modernize the presidential election system without a constitutional amendment.
Failed Constitutional Amendments
On September 18, 1969, the House passed a direct election
amendment with a strong bipartisan vote (338-70), while heavily bipartisan,
the effort died in the Senate in 1970 due to a filibuster, led by Southern
senators. Despite roughly 80% public support and a 338-70 House vote in
favor, the proposal died when the 91st Congress ended.
1979: A proposal to abolish the Electoral College failed in the Senate
with a 51-48 vote, falling short of the required two-thirds majority.
Post-2000/2016: Despite the winner of the popular vote losing the
presidency, subsequent attempts to pass constitutional amendments have
failed to gain traction, due to the partisan perception that the system favors
Republicans.
Why the NPVIC is True Federalism
Exercises state sovereignty: The Constitution explicitly grants states the absolute authority to choose how they allocate their electors.
Protects local control: It bypasses federal overreach by keeping the election process firmly in the hands of state legislatures.
Reduces federal intervention: It solves a structural democratic issue through state-level cooperation rather than a federal mandate.
Encourages state collaboration: It creates a voluntary pact among equal states to achieve a shared, nationwide goal.
Preserves the Electoral College: It changes how electors are assigned instead of abolishing the constitutional framework entirely.
The 2026 midterm elections are directly relevant to the enactment of the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC) because they will decide control of the state legislatures that hold the remaining 48 electoral votes needed to activate the agreement. Following Virginia's entry into the compact, the NPVIC sits at 222 of the required 270 electoral votes. Because no Republican governor has ever signed the NPVIC, the compact's survival and activation depend entirely on Democrats gaining or holding legislative trifectas in a specific handful of battleground and purple states during the November 3, 2026, midterms.
The relevance of each specified state to the NPVIC’s mathematical and legislative path to 270 is detailed below.
The Immediate Path to 270 (The Primary Catalysts)
To bridge the 48-vote gap, NPVIC strategists are targeting four key states where legislative margins are razor-thin. Winning trifectas here in the 2026 midterms could allow the compact to cross the finish line in the 2027 legislative session.
Michigan (15 Electoral Votes): The 2026 midterms are critical for defending or expanding narrow legislative margins. Because Michigan has previously passed the NPVIC in one chamber, securing a supportive legislature is the highest-priority step toward capturing nearly a third of the remaining 48 votes.
Pennsylvania (19 Electoral Votes): As the largest remaining prize on the plausible path, the balance of power determined in the 2026 midterms will make or break the compact. Proponents view Pennsylvania as essential; without its 19 votes, the math to reach 270 without deep-red states becomes nearly impossible.
Arizona (11 Electoral Votes): Arizona has historically shown bipartisan openness to the compact, having passed it in the House in 2016. The 2026 legislative elections will determine if a unified majority will finally pass it through both chambers and send it to the governor.
Nevada (6 Electoral Votes): Nevada passed the NPVIC via both chambers in 2023 but failed to pass it a mandatory second time in 2025 to send it to voters as a constitutional amendment. The 2026 legislative races will decide if a new majority will revive the push.
The Alternates (The Secondary Math Insurance)
If any of the primary states fail to flip or hold, these states serve as critical structural backups to reach the 270 threshold.
Wisconsin (10 Electoral Votes): Wisconsin has previously introduced NPVIC legislation (such as HB 156). The 2026 midterms are crucial for breaking entrenched majorities to position the state as a viable 10-vote substitute if Pennsylvania or Michigan stalls.
New Hampshire (4 Electoral Votes): While small, New Hampshire represents vital "insurance" votes. The 2026 midterms will decide if the state's highly volatile legislative chambers swing toward reformers looking to edge the compact over the 270-vote finish line.
The Defensive & Long-Term Targets
Georgia (16 Electoral Votes) & Texas (40 Electoral Votes): Under current political alignments, neither state is a candidate to join the compact in the immediate future due to unified opposition from conservative leadership. However, the 2026 midterms in Georgia and Texas serve as a long-term barometer. If demographic shifts alter legislative margins, it forces the national landscape away from a "winner-take-all" defensive strategy, potentially shifting how both opponents and proponents value the Electoral College over the next decade.
The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC) is an agreement among U.S. states and the District of Columbia to award all their electoral votes to the presidential candidate who wins the overall popular vote nationwide.
The National Popular Vote interstate Compact (NPVIC) What It Is - Why It's Needed, YouTube video is summarized as, follows:
What It Is
The Mechanism: Participating states pass laws pledging their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote (the total number of individual votes cast across all 50 states and D.C.).
The Trigger: The compact does not change the U.S. Constitution. It stays inactive until enough states join to reach 270 electoral votes, the magic number required to win the presidency.
The Result: Once activated, it guarantees that the candidate who receives the most votes across the entire country wins the White House, without needing a constitutional amendment.
Current Status: As of August 31,2026, 18 states and Washington, D.C., representing 222 electoral votes, have enacted the compact, needing 48 more electoral votes to take effect.
Why It's Needed
Prevents Popular Vote Mismatches: Under the current Electoral College system, a candidate can win the national popular vote yet still lose the election (which happened in 1824, 1876, 1888, 2000, and 2016). Proponents argue this undermines the democratic principle that the candidate with the most votes should win.
Eliminates Swing State Focus: Currently, presidential campaigns focus almost entirely on a handful of tightly contested "battleground" states. Voters in safely "red" or "blue" states are largely ignored. The NPVIC ensures every vote in every state matters equally.
Encourages Higher Voter Turnout: When people feel their individual votes do not matter in a lopsided state, they may stay home. The compact gives every citizen a direct stake in the national total, boosting civic participation.
Hugh J. Campbell, Jr., CPA, is a Governance, Risk & Compliance (GRC) professional and a student of W. Edwards Deming, the American statistician often credited as the catalyst for the Japanese economic miracle after WWII.
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