Restore Confidence in Democracy: Guiding Principles for Election Administration

This brief is part of “Election 2024: Policy Playbook,” a series by Rice University and the Baker Institute that offers critical context, analysis, and recommendations to inform policymaking in the United States and Texas.

The Big Picture

• A decentralized electoral system in the U.S. has led to confusion among voters and contributed to distrust in election results.
• While the 2024 electoral process is already underway, The Carter Center and Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy have identified ten ways that election processes could be improved in the future.
• Applying these election principles would guarantee that U.S. voters have equal access to the ballot box and ensure no political party gains an unfair advantage by altering local election procedures and policies.
• With distrust in voting at an all-time high, the U.S. must take steps to provide equitable access and ballot security in order to restore confidence in democracy.

Why It Matters

The 2020 election and the events that followed, including those of Jan. 6, 2021, have hypercharged an already partisan atmosphere. Distrust of, and hostility toward, the election system and those who administer it are at distressing all-time highs. Add growing interference from nations and other bad actors outside the United States, and an environment exists where elections and the American system of democracy face unprecedented challenges. These trends are occurring as the nation moves into what is almost certainly going to be another fiercely contested and momentous presidential election year — one that could affect the public’s trust in the U.S. electoral system for years to come.

Expert Analysis

To meet these challenges, The Carter Center and Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy collaborated to develop bipartisan guiding principles for election administration in the U.S. These principles are intended to assist the election community, including elected officials, state and county boards of election, policymakers, advocates, and the media. Moreover, the identified principles are crucial to a healthy election system everywhere, even as individual policies and procedures continue to vary across electoral jurisdiction. The goal is to provide a framework for effective bipartisan policies that balance the linchpins required for Americans to retain faith in their elections.

These principles should not be considered a blueprint for uniformity in the nation’s voting rules and procedures. America’s decentralized voting system is unique. Instead, the 10 principles should be viewed as an overarching set of standards that can guide state and local election officials as they develop their own specific ways to conduct elections. While some states have not adopted all of these principles, each state is faithful to some. This alone is evidence of the strength of our election system — even as the opportunity for improvement exists.

The 10 proposed principles are not intended to advantage one side or another. Instead, it is our that hope Democrats and Republicans alike can use them as guidelines for developing sensible and pragmatic election laws that benefit everyone. In doing so, we hope they will follow the wisdom of former President Jimmy Carter and Secretary of State James A. Baker, III when they wrote: “Not everything Republicans propose is voter suppression and not everything Democrats propose makes fraud easier.”

Policy Actions

The 10 principles included in the collaborative report, “Guiding Principles for Election Administration,” can be summarized as follows:

1) America’s election system — and the democracy it supports — should be a national priority. Because American democracy depends on the nation’s election system, its regulations must be guided by principles of fairness that preclude partisanship. It is vital that policymakers at every level adequately fund election processes, that law enforcement be given the resources to investigate threats against election officials, and that both lawmakers and the media oppose efforts to deny, disrupt, or discredit electoral outcomes.

2) Election laws and policies should be clear, transparent, and well-communicated to the public. States and localities must clearly communicate basic election information about all aspects of voting, from voter registration to certification of results. Any efforts to amend election procedures should be mounted sufficiently in advance of Election Day and communicated to voters in a timely manner. Judges clarifying election regulations should provide clear guidance in advance of election season so that officials and voters have time to adapt to the required changes.

3) Voter registration should be easy, secure, well-run, and widely available to all who qualify. As the gateway to voting, voter registration should be transparent and widely available — ideally online. Voters should be able to easily verify or update their registration. And if outside organizations are permitted to conduct voter registration drives, the procedures for doing so should allow eligible voters to be added to the rolls without complicated rules or restrictions. Conversely, to ensure accurate voter rolls, states should commit to identifying voters who have died, moved, or are otherwise no longer eligible.

4) Procedures for receiving and casting a ballot should be flexible enough to meet the needs of all voters equally. An urban community with millions of voters has very different needs than a rural one with a few thousand. Policymakers and election officials should treat all voters equally to ensure that no one is at a disadvantage just because of where they live. In states that require photo IDs to vote, officials should ensure that IDs are sufficiently available so that no eligible resident is turned away from the polls because they lack the proper identification.

5) Voting technology should be a gateway, not a barrier, to the voting process. Technology should be used to ensure that the election process is equally accessible to all voters, including those with disabilities, as well as flexible and secure for citizens and election workers alike. This same user-friendly approach should be applied to all voting technology, such as electronic pollbooks and ballot-on-demand printers. Technology used to record votes should have a voter-verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT), allowing voters to check that their vote was cast and permitting recounts, audits, and backups in case of malfunction.

6) States and localities should prioritize policies that allow cast ballots to be received on or before Election Day so that final counts can be completed soon after the close of polls. In this age of disinformation and cyber warfare, concentrating voting into a single one-day period raises serious security concerns and makes it difficult for election officials to recover from attacks or malfunctions. Spreading voting options out over time and offering multiple modes of voting (early, mail, Election Day) makes voting more resilient against potential attacks. In order to eliminate the controversy that arises when results are delayed, procedures should be adopted to ensure that early ballots are returned to election officials in time to be processed and counted as soon as possible — ideally before or at the same time as ballots cast in person on Election Day.

7) Military and overseas voters should continue to have the opportunity to cast timely and valid ballots. The U.S. has long been committed to the voting rights of military and overseas citizens but challenges remain. States and localities should continue to work with the Federal Voting Assistance Program to provide ample information resources online and elsewhere so these voters can learn how to vote and avoid unnecessary restrictions or paperwork on how they do it.

8) Tabulation of election returns should be transparent and proceed in an orderly fashion. Policymakers and election officials must continue to prioritize accuracy in the tabulation and certification of votes. Existing procedures can be combined with transparency, bipartisanship, and legal technological safeguards to create multiple layers of defense — including a robust chain of custody, a detailed audit trail, and cybersecurity controls. Procedures for observing tabulation and reporting results should ensure that the process is not impeded with unnecessary questions or challenges. The media can do its part by emphasizing that incomplete returns — and any projections based on those totals — are not final results.

9) Jurisdictions should commit to regular and rigorous audits of the election process. Audits of results — as well as audits during the lead-up to Election Day to confirm ballot proofing, ballot management, mail ballot procedures, and voter list accuracy — can help verify for voters the integrity of the entire process and double-check the accuracy of any given result. States and localities should regularly engage in audits, using the latest available techniques and best practices to examine and validate election reliability.

10) The United States should embrace recognized standards and best practices for elections and should welcome nonpartisan independent election observation efforts. States and localities should be open to having nonpartisan and independent election observers, subject to appropriate legal provisions and physical/cybersecurity precautions. Credentialing observers should conform with prevailing state and local standards and include pre-election training as well as adequate access to observing key aspects of the election process.

To learn more about these principles and the rationale behind them, review the full report.

The Bottom Line

With distrust in voting at an all-time high, the U.S. must take steps to provide both equitable access and ballot security in order to restore confidence in democracy now and for future elections. Adopting the 10 nonpartisan election principles created by The Carter Center and Baker Institute could help restore trust in the election process.

This material may be quoted or reproduced without prior permission, provided appropriate credit is given to the author and Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. The views expressed herein are those of the individual author(s), and do not necessarily represent the views of Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy.