WSJ Accused of Rewriting Trump Midterm History as Cato's Walter Olson Says He Did Try To Meddle in Voting

The Wall Street Journal has drawn criticism from Cato Institute senior fellow Walter Olson over an editorial dismissing fears that President Donald Trump would interfere with voting in the 2026 midterms. Olson argued that the newspaper overlooked actions and litigation that he maintained amounted to improper attempts to influence the election.

The dispute concerns the administration's conduct before the vote. Olson pointed to a March 2025 executive order, an unsuccessful proposal involving the US Postal Service and legal challenges concerning vote tabulation in California and certification in Alaska as reasons to reject the editorial's account.

WSJ Challenged Over Trump Midterm History

Olson, a senior fellow at Cato's Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies, challenged the Journal's dismissal of concerns about election interference as 'hyperventilating'. He argued that its treatment of those concerns omitted much of the record preceding the midterms.

'The editorial's chosen narrative requires a great forgetfulness about the actual record. It is clear that for the past 18 months, Trump has indeed been intent on messing with the midterms,' Olson stated.

His criticism reached back to the March 2025 executive order concerning federal authority over elections. He contended that Trump had sought to extend presidential power into an area the Constitution assigns to states.

For Olson, that order formed part of a sequence of attempted interventions. His account also encompassed proposals concerning postal voting and litigation over how ballots would be counted and election results certified.

Walter Olson Cites Trump Voting Efforts

Olson described an unsuccessful plan involving Trump's appointees at the US Postal Service, arguing that it would have placed decisions about who could vote by mail in their hands.

'The administration continued with Trump's abortive plan to install his appointees at the US Postal Service as deciders of who would be permitted to vote by mail,' Olson continued. He connected that proposal to subsequent court challenges concerning election procedures in two states.

'And it further continued with his meritless last-minute litigation seeking to interfere with vote tabulation in California and certification in Alaska.'

Olson's descriptions of those cases as meritless and intended to interfere with voting procedures were central to his rejection of the Journal's position. He maintained that attempted interventions belonged in the account of the midterms even where they had not succeeded.

Trump Midterm History and Court Action

Olson also cited a Supreme Court action involving the administration's challenge to California vote tabulation.

'As late as Monday, in a moment all the more devastating for its quietness, the US Supreme Court denied, without explanation, a call for response or noted dissent of the administration's request to keep alive its absurd suit seeking to interfere with California tabulation,' Olson wrote.

His criticism extended beyond litigation over ballots and certification. He also accused Trump of undermining confidence in the electoral system and targeting lawyers who had opposed him and his allies in election disputes.

'Nor do the various other ways Trump set the stage, including relentlessly sowing doubt about the system's honesty and issuing penalty orders intended to destroy law firms and particular lawyers who had previously bested him and his allies in court on election matters,' Olson added.