Trump Is Wrong about Jimmy Carter: My Grandfather Trusted Mail-in Voting

Regarding the Aug. 19 news article “Trump says he will seek to eliminate mail-in voting”:

President Donald Trump recently announced plans to issue an executive order that would seek to ban mail-in voting. During this announcement, he misquoted former president Jimmy Carter, my grandfather, as saying, “You will never have an honest election if you have mail-in.”

That is not true.

Trump appeared to be referring to the 2005 Commission on Federal Election Reform, co-chaired by my grandfather and former secretary of state James A. Baker III, which noted that voting by mail can increase logistical challenges and the potential for voter fraud, especially if safeguards are lacking.
However, this cherry-picked excerpt does not consider the rest of the report’s findings or my grandfather’s acknowledgment of the safeguards that have emerged in the 20 years since this report came out.

Since 2005, states have gained substantial experience in absentee voting and vote-by-mail and have demonstrated that these methods can be both safe and secure. One notable example is Montana — a Republican stronghold that voted for Trump in all three elections by an overwhelming margin and where 72 percent of the population voted by mail in 2024.

In fact, my grandfather was so convinced by the improved safeguards for mail-in voting that in 2020 he said, “I urge political leaders across the country to take immediate steps to expand vote-by-mail and other measures that can help protect the core of American democracy — the right of our citizens to vote.”

And, as with many other aspects of his life, my grandfather didn’t just talk the talk. For the last 10 years of his life, my grandfather faithfully voted by mail in Georgia. Something, by the way, that he had in common with another American president who has repeatedly used absentee voting and vote-by-mail: Donald Trump.

Jason Carter, Atlanta

The writer is chair of the board of trustees of The Carter Center.