Election Assistance Commission EAC

The disputed 2000 presidential election in Florida, with its punch-card ballots and recounts, led Congress to pass the Help America Vote Act, signed on October 29, 2002. The law provided billions of dollars to replace outdated voting equipment, required provisional ballots and statewide voter registration databases, and created the Election Assistance Commission. The EAC has four commissioners, two from each major party, appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate, and needs three votes to act.

Because states and localities run American elections, the EAC has little regulatory power. It adopts the Voluntary Voting System Guidelines, most recently version 2.0 in 2021, accredits testing laboratories, and certifies voting machines against those standards, which many states require by law. It distributes and audits federal election security grants to states, collects nationwide data on how elections are run, and shares best practices with election officials. It also maintains the national mail voter registration form created under the National Voter Registration Act of 1993.

A March 2025 executive order directed the EAC to require documentary proof of citizenship on the national registration form and to tie certain funding to state compliance with federal priorities. Federal courts blocked key parts of the order, ruling that the Constitution gives the President no power over election rules and that Congress had assigned these decisions to the bipartisan Commission. Supporters of the order said it would prevent noncitizen voting, while critics and many election officials said noncitizen voting is rare and the requirement would keep eligible citizens from registering.