2026-09-01T17:13:52.320Z / 美国有线电视新闻网（CNN）
那位曾基于谎言试图推翻2020年大选、且似乎对2021年1月6日其支持者的暴力暴动无动于衷的总统，可能会试图操纵2026年中期选举，这一点应该不足为奇。
目前尚不清楚唐纳德·特朗普总统干预2026年大选的努力是否真的会奏效。
但近期的事态发展应该能让人们认清现实：他正在尝试这么做，且可能带来恶劣后果。
首先，CNN独家报道称，美国国土安全部正在加大力度，在少数几个州调查所谓的选民欺诈问题。
这听起来或许本身并不令人震惊，但其中有诸多不合常规之处。
此次行动涉及移民海关执法局下属的国土安全调查部门，该部门通常负责人口贩运、毒品走私等其他犯罪案件。
但最值得警惕的原因，在于此次行动距离2026年选举仅两个多月的时间间隔。正如CNN的普里西拉·阿尔瓦雷斯、蒂尔尼·斯尼德和加布·科恩所指出的，联邦政府通常会避免在选举临近之际开展此类“公开”调查行动。原因在于，未经彻底核查的单纯指控可能会影响选举结果。
但就特朗普和所谓的选民欺诈而言，这恰恰是其有意为之，而非失误。
十年来，特朗普一直试图证实其关于大规模选举欺诈的说法，但均以失败告终。在其第一任期内，他成立的选民欺诈委员会几乎毫无成果便宣告解散。2020年大选后，他的竞选团队花钱找人调查大规模选举欺诈问题，同样一无所获。
本届政府近期拿出的不过是大量人为制造的烟雾弹。
其中包括其关于仅四个州就有25万非公民登记投票的虚假说法，以及上个月美国人口普查局发布的一份极不规范的未署名报告，声称有数万非公民在2020年总统大选中投了票。（专家们已对这两项说法提出谴责。）
鉴于国土安全部的职权范围，此次国土安全部的行动似乎旨在推动这类说法的传播。
但如果此前为寻找大规模选民欺诈所做的努力都未能拿出任何实质性证据，那么国土安全部在短短两个月内改变这一局面的可能性似乎微乎其微。
当然，拿出无可辩驳的欺诈证据可能并非此次行动的目的。特朗普政府的目标似乎是播下更多怀疑的种子——甚至可能为联邦政府进一步干预选举创造借口（我们稍后会谈到这一点）。
本周另一项重大事态发展是，一名匿名联邦举报人就特朗普政府新推出的邮件选票验证系统发出了重大警告。该举报人表示，该系统已经沦为工作人员口中的“一团糟”，可能导致大量邮寄选票的选民被剥夺投票权。
这份由康涅狄格州民主党参议员理查德·布卢门撒尔公布的举报人报告，进一步加剧了选举官员此前的担忧：该系统在2026年中期选举前并未经过充分测试。
根据举报人提供的信息，如果大批量选票中的单个信封扫描信息与系统内的信息不符，美国邮政总局将不会递送整批选票，直到 discrepancies 得到解决。
目前尚不清楚该系统是否真的会投入使用；这一问题正处于广泛的诉讼程序中。但曾在佛罗里达州进行过邮寄投票的特朗普长期以来一直抨击邮寄投票。而且由于邮寄投票的选民大多倾向民主党，因此如果邮寄选票的选民被剥夺投票权，可能会对民主党造成不成比例的打击。
这些事态发展进一步加剧了人们对未来可能出现状况的警惕。
特朗普于3月签署行政命令，赋予美国邮政总局前所未有的邮件选票筛查权限。到6月时，CNN报道称，该政府计划威胁不为那些拒绝向联邦政府提交选民名单的州递送邮寄选票。
（就连一些红色州也拒绝提交这些选民名单。）
到7月，特朗普发表了一场黄金时段演讲，并未拿出任何大规模选举欺诈的新证据，却夸大了中国所谓的相关企图，并无端声称此事遭到掩盖。这场演讲因援引国家安全议题而引发关注，而法院通常会在涉及国家安全的情况下给予总统更大的单边行动空间。
几周后，特朗普并未排除这种可能性。在一次采访中，他暗示有可能宣布国家紧急状态，以推行共和党控制的国会未能通过的一系列投票改革，包括限制邮寄投票。
上周则出现了一个尤为引人注目的场景。
鉴于长期以来人们担忧特朗普政府可能会过度干预投票进程，一个深红州的共和党州长指责司法部的选举监督员在该州初选中的行为“具有攻击性”，并补充道：“我不喜欢联邦政府插手我们的选举。”
怀俄明州州长马克·戈登已要求该州总检察长展开调查。
特朗普此前曾表示，后悔未能在2020年大选后扣押投票机。
目前尚无法确定这些事态发展中的哪一项可能会在2026年大选前导致具体行动或问题。特朗普倾向于抛出各种举措，有时在证明不切实际后便会收手。其他时候，他及其团队的努力则显得半生不熟或笨拙不堪。法院可能会阻止他推行邮寄选票相关计划等举措。
但正如CNN的扎卡里·B·沃尔夫周末所写的那样，今年秋季中期选举前存在一系列潜在的噩梦场景。
而特朗普所在的政党正面临一场艰难的选举，民主党可能会拿下至少一个国会参众两院席位——从而可能削弱特朗普在其总统任期最后两年的权力——因此，我们有必要认真对待这些可能性。
历史和近期事态发展表明，特朗普完全有能力做出种种出格举动。
The light is blinking red on Trump messing with the 2026 election
2026-09-01T17:13:52.320Z / CNN
It should surprise nobody that the president who tried to overturn the 2020 election based on lies — and didn’t seem to mind his supporters rising up violently on January 6, 2021 — might try to monkey with the 2026 midterm elections.
It remains to be seen whether President Donald Trump’s efforts to interfere in the 2026 election will actually work.
But recent developments should serve as a reality check that he’s trying, with potentially ugly results.
First, CNN reported exclusively that the Department of Homeland Security is surging efforts to find supposed voter fraud in a handful of states.
While that might not sound shocking in and of itself, there is plenty about it that’s irregular.
The effort involves using an arm of Immigration and Customs Enforcement called Homeland Security Investigations, which typically handles other crimes like human trafficking and drug smuggling.
But mostly, the reason it should raise eyebrows is because of the proximity to the 2026 election, now just a little more than two months away. As CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez, Tierney Sneed and Gabe Cohen note, the federal government typically avoids such “overt” investigatory actions so close to an election. The reason is that mere allegations that haven’t been thoroughly examined could influence the election.
But when it comes to Trump and alleged voter fraud, that’s a feature rather than a bug.
Trump has spent a decade trying and failing to substantiate his claims of widespread fraud. In his first term, he launched a voter fraud commission that folded with little to show. His campaign paid people to find widespread fraud after the 2020 election, to no avail.
What the administration has produced of late is a lot of manufactured smoke.
That includes its bogus claim about 250,000 noncitizens being registered to vote in just four states. It also includes a highly unorthodox unsigned report from the US Census Bureau last month claiming tens of thousands of noncitizens voted in the 2020 presidential election. (Experts have decried both claims.)
The DHS effort would seem to be geared toward promoting such claims, given the department’s purview.
But if other efforts to find widespread voter fraud didn’t produce anything substantive, the odds would appear slim that DHS will change that in just two months.
Of course, producing ironclad evidence of fraud probably isn’t the point. The Trump administration’s goal appears to be seeding more doubt — and possibly even creating a pretext for more federal intervention in the election (which we’ll get to).
The other big development this week was an unnamed federal whistleblower issuing a major warning about the Trump administration’s new system for verifying mail ballots. The system has devolved into what workers describe as a “sh*t show” that could lead to mass disenfranchisement of mail voters, the whistleblower says
The whistleblower report, released by Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, builds on concerns previously expressed by election officials that the system has not been sufficiently tested ahead of the 2026 midterms.
According to the whistleblower, if even a single ballot envelope scan in a large batch of ballots doesn’t comport with the information in the system, the US Postal Service won’t deliver the entire batch until the discrepancy is resolved.
It remains to be seen whether the system will actually be used; the issue is the subject of extensive litigation. But Trump — who has himself voted by mail in Florida — has long decried mail voting. And because of that, it skews substantially toward Democrats.
In other words, if mail voters are disenfranchised, it could disproportionately hurt Democrats.
These developments only add to the warning signs about what might lay ahead.
Trump in March signed the executive order giving the USPS an unprecedented role in screening mail ballots. By June, CNN reported that the administration was planning to threaten not to deliver mail ballots for states that failed to turn over their voter lists to the federal government.
(Even some red states have resisted turning over those voter lists.)
By July, Trump delivered a primetime speech that provided no new evidence of widespread fraud, but did exaggerate China’s supposed efforts and baselessly claimed it had been covered up. That turned heads because it invoked national security, and courts generally give presidents greater latitude to take unilateral actions if national security is at stake.
And a few weeks later, Trump declined to rule out precisely such a scenario. In an interview, he left open the possibility of declaring a national security emergency to institute a series of voting changes that the GOP-controlled Congress has failed to pass, including limiting mail voting.
And last week brought a particularly striking scene.
Amid longstanding concerns that the Trump administration might overzealously insert itself into the voting process, the Republican governor of a dark-red state accused Justice Department election monitors of “aggressive” behavior while observing that state’s primary election.
Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon asked his state’s attorney general to investigate, while adding: “I don’t like the federal government coming in and taking our votes.”
Trump has previously expressed regret for not seizing voting machines after the 2020 election.
It’s impossible to say which of these developments might lead to concrete action or problems ahead of the 2026 election. Trump tends to throw things at the wall, and sometimes he backs off when they prove impractical. Other times, his and his team’s efforts prove half-baked or ham-handed. The courts could get in his way on things like his plans for mail ballots.
But as CNN’s Zachary B. Wolf wrote this weekend, there are a bevy of potential nightmare scenarios in play ahead of this fall’s midterms.
And with Trump’s party staring down a difficult election that could give Democrats at least one chamber of Congress — and thus could sap Trump of power over his final two years as president — it’s worth taking those possibilities seriously.
History and recent developments suggest Trump is capable of plenty.
