What A Day - Secretaries of State Prepare For A Midterms Showdown

Episode Date: September 23, 2026

The Constitution says states, not the federal government, run elections. But the Trump administration is trying to mess with the midterms. Jane talks to Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar about what states are doing to protect elections for their constituents.Show Notes: Check out Cisco's reelection campaign – https://cisconv.co/ Call Congress – 202-224-3121 Subscribe to the What A Day Newsletter – https://tinyurl.com/y4y2e9jy What A Day – YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/@whatadaypodcast Follow us on Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/crookedmedia/ For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail]

The Constitution is very clear that states run elections, not the federal government, and the Constitution, the framers drafted that language because they didn't want it to prevent what's actually happening right now, where you have a president that it has some deranged obsession with the 2020 election, the 22 election, and the 24 election, which, again, like you said, he won in 24. It's Wednesday, September 23rd. I'm Jane Koston, and this is what a day. First lady Melania Trump had a busy morning in New York today.

She rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange to launch Imperia, her new invitation-only initiative for women's CEOs, because when I think of the Trump administration, I think women's empowerment. She also sat down on the Fox and Friends couch to share some personal insight into her husband's second term in the White House. How is the president doing in Trump, too, as compared to Trump? Trump one. How do you see him handling the job differently? He's very focused. He has a lot on his plate. It's very different. What's going on around the world now. But I think he's doing the best that he can. He works nonstop. He has the most

energy than anybody. He's from morning till evening nonstop working. Trump 2.0. This is the best he can do. What is Trump up to today? He's back in Washington meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. The start of a three-day visit that will feature a state dinner, a military flyover, and lots and lots of pandering to the man Trump has described as a quote, great leader. Hey, speaking of something provoked by a terrible leader, the Department of Homeland Security said Tuesday that the immigration and customs enforcement officer who shot a Venezuelan man in the back in Austin, Texas on Sunday, was issued a body camera but wasn't using it. The man who was, again, shot in the back and also was driving for DoorDash, is now being held in an ice facility.

And when we talk about terrible leadership, we have to talk about health and human services secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. According to reporting from the Wall Street Journal, Kennedy's enhanced security needs meant that HHS transfer $12 million from the Office of Minority Health to help pay for it. Because, of course, it did. But I want to talk about elections. Specifically, I want to talk about how the Trump administration is trying to mess with the midterms and what states are trying to do about it. Joining me is Nevada Secretary of State, Cisco Aguilar.

He's running for re-election this fall. Secretary Aguilar, welcome to why today. Thank you for having me. It's an honor to be here. Okay. So the Trump administration has been after your state's voting records, and they've threatened you within an investigation for failing to comply with voting laws. And if you're not watching this, I'm using air quotes because this seems nonsensical to me. But what was your response?

When I first read the email, I thought, this is pretty funny. It's actually interesting the fact that they would send me this letter after all this time. And the fact that the letter said I was under official investigation since 2025. And this is the first knowledge of it. We had some instances of news reports telling us that the U.S. attorney in Nevada was investigating our office over some issues. And then that got debunked later on by the press. So this has been going back and forth for quite some time all the way back to the 24 election, I would say, when they suit us almost every other day on some issue or some topic. Yeah. I mean, this is all

about the 2024 election, which, as a side note, it's super weird that Donald Trump is fixated on an election that he won? Like, all of this is about that. So, and it's about allegations of non-citizen voting in Nevada. The federal government alleged that some 15,000 non-citizens could be on the election rolls. But when you met with federal officials, what was the actual number of non-citizens they could find? Well, that they could research at that time. Was it 185, you know, my team had that meeting with them because I thought, you know, I'm going to take myself out of it. I'll let them be professionals, let them be the individuals that they are and have a substantial or a substantive conversation about what we're discussing. I thought if I was there, I probably animated a little bit more and let the people that

do the real work have those conversations. But that conversation was not very good. You know, from a professional standpoint, you would expect more from the federal government to be able to have a conversation like adults and be able to come forward with some real information. And when they presented the information, we were like, what do you, please explain us your methodology. First of all, how did you get to these numbers? What data sets did you use? And please, actually send us the data set so we can look at it and understanding what you are seeing. And we finally got the data set from them the next day.

And that data set was fascinating. There were 6,400 people on that list, but it only had four columns. And one column was a voter case number. It wasn't even a voter ID number. The next column was just NV for Nevada. because they were all supposedly in Nevada. The third column was whether or not they were a citizen. It was an N or a Y.

And then the fourth column was, had they looked into these individuals? And of those 6,400, only 185 had been looked into by DHS. Yeah. I appreciate that you expected more from the federal government, which I don't right now. But thinking about this issue, so the Supreme Court ruled against the Trump administration on mail-in ballots a few weeks ago. What was your response to that ruling? And what does that ruling mean for your state's voters? Well, first of all, that's the second case Nevada's run, one this year at the U.S. Supreme Court. We won a case earlier this year that said we can accept

mail ballots after election day that are postmarked by election day, which happens to benefit our military members serving overseas. You know, they're fighting every day for our freedoms, especially now and everything that's going on globally. But they should have a right to have a say in who's elected. in Nevada, given the fact that they are there representing us. The second one was our case, which I was the happiest person in America when that ruling came down, because it meant that we could continue to run our elections as we've run them in the past. You know, this Republican Supreme Court was potentially going to disrupt our elections and really federalize them in a way that they've never been federalized before. The Constitution is very clear that states run elections,

not the federal government. And the Constitution, the framers drafted the that language because they didn't want it to prevent what's actually happening right now, where you have a president that it has some deranged obsession with the 2020 election, the 22 election, and the 24 election, which, again, like you said, he won in 24. Yeah, and you mentioned members of the military who vote by mail, but what percentage of Nevadans vote by mail? Does it differ for presidential elections, midterms? What does that look like? So I'll give you two statistics. Most recently in our June primary, 60% of Nevada is voted by mail. 86% of registered voters in Nevada have used mail at some

point since 22. We know that mail is the preferred choice to participate in our elections. And what's really interesting is our two Redis counties, Nye and Douglas County, are the highest adopters of mail ballots. Yeah, I mean, it's interesting because this fight against mail in voting, which, one, Donald Trump votes by mail, but two. to lots of people, including lots of Republicans and lots of people in rural states. But you told Democracy Docket that you think that the Trump administration has managed to massively damage Nevada's faith in mail in voting. And you mentioned, you know, 60% of people in June voted by mail, but how do you respond to that where you have an administration where it seems like

even if they lose in court, which they keep doing, they win by making people feel anxious about voting by mail or voting in general. Well, the fact that they tried to take over an independent federal agency, which is the United States Postal Service. The Postal Service is one of the most trusted organizations at the federal government level. And the fact that the Postal Service took a role in trying to federalize the elections was really disappointed. Again, that wasn't the postal workers. That was a failed attempt by new leadership of the Postal Service. The fact that the postal workers every day are working to ensure that we get our mail,

but they also care that their neighbor gets a mail ballot. and uses that ballot to participate in our elections. So I have faith in the fact that our postal workers are working every day to make that happen. What I don't have faith in is the fact that they're going to try to figure out a way to intervene. And they did. And they brought that credibility down on the postal service. So now, as local elections officials and as the Secretary of State, we're trying to talk to voters every day to say, hey, our elections are safe, secure, and accessible.

We can have accessibility and not jeopardize the safety and security of our elections. So we're talking, we're communicating with voters every day. We're trying to build that trust. We implemented new systems in our elections in Nevada. We invested heavily. We implemented a new voter registration election management system. We use new machines for in-person voting that are no longer the machines that were used in 2020, 22. And so the fact that we've invested heavily is educating voters about these processes and why our systems are safe and secure. Again, it's reminding people that local elections officials live in our communities. They are our neighbors. They know our voters.

They care about our communities. They want to do the best job they can to ensure our elections work. We'll get back to my conversation with Secretary Aguilar in a moment. What a Day is brought to you by homeserve. Here's the thing about the home disasters that sneak up and bite you. Most of them cost more than a car repair. HomeServe offers plans starting at $4.99 a month. With HomeServe, when something goes wrong, you're not scrambling.

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What you're doing is telling a population of voters, hey, you shouldn't participate in the elections because it potentially could bring you some liability. And, you know, Latinos are hardworking people. They're working hard right now to make sure they can put food on the table. They can educate their kids. And with the rising cost, this becomes harder every single day. There is high stress within families across Nevada. and when they're saying, hey, I need to vote or am I going to be subject to potential liability? I have enough stress in my life.

I'm going to opt out from this election cycle until things settle down. And that's the real danger. The fact that 30% of our population is being targeted and the fact that Nevada has some of the slimmest margins in the country when it comes to our elections, we need to be very careful about making sure we're not marginalizing anyone across the state because our voice matters. it's critical to the outcome of our elections. I actually wanted to ask, thinking about what voters are most concerned about in Nevada, because I know Republicans are going very hard in Nevada,

not just about this voter rolls nonsense, but also about, hey, we give you no tax on tips. That was the whole thing that they're going after, especially after people who work in Nevada's giant service economy. How much have you been hearing from voters about, like, you know, I would vote for a Democrat, but no tax on tips. I'm just interested to see how much that's actually seeping through or if that's something people are talking about, especially as life gets more unaffordable for pretty much everybody. I think they realize they've been conned into something that's really not accurate.

That conversation sounds good on paper, but the actual implementation has not benefited the average worker in Nevada because they never rise to the level of having to see that as a benefit. So the fact that this was promised, everybody had these high expectations that it was going to be a great opportunity for them. But then when it comes down to it and people are filing their taxes, they're not seeing the benefit that was promised to them. And I think they see it as a con job. So there's an Atlantic piece out today about Trump's inner circle of supporters basically demanding he declare martial law for the midterms. Now I'm going to quote here. there's a person who is talking about the possibilities for this election. Quote, the first, a smooth election won't happen in his view because he claims without evidence.

Democrats already cheated in the primaries. The second is that Trump takes action before the election to prevent cheating. The last option is that Trump tries to declare martial law on or around November 3rd. Now, the piece is interesting. It kind of goes into this back and forth about all these people trying to convince Trump that either he should do this or that this is a very bad idea. but as someone who has to think about the implications of all of this on the everyday voter, the person who is not locked into politics, the person who isn't paying attention to this conversation, the person who's just like, I'm going to stop by before I drop off my kids at

school, how do you reckon with that kind of person having that kind of pull with the White House? It's dangerous. It's dangerous to our democracy. It's dangerous to our country. But as secretaries, we have to be crisis managers. We have to think about. about every potential opportunity this president could usurp our elections. And we're preparing for them. We've been preparing for them over the last year. We're meeting with all the Democratic secretaries across the country. We're meeting with attorney generals to say, what is our strategy and how are we going to

respond to these issues? And we've been doing this legal research for a really long time. The great thing about this is there's been a huge brain drain at the DOJ. A lot of those lawyers left. And now they're in the private sector. And they're on our teams. And they're mad as hell because they've seen an organization that they work for for a significant amount of time just lose complete credibility moving forward. And the fact that we have those legal minds on our team to say, okay, in this situation, how are we going to respond?

What is our legal strategy? But also, too, how are we going to keep voters calm and confident in the overall process? And again, the fact that they don't understand the rule of law, we have a president who doesn't understand the rule of law. law is really hitting voters to say, look, we need some consistency, we need leadership. We don't need somebody who's going to always be out there trying to do something that benefits himself only and not the American population. Yeah. It's striking how Trump's response to the midterms is to limit the number of people who can vote,

not to give those people who can vote something to vote for. that's it's very strange watching this. Has that been something like, you know, you've been doing this job for a long time? I remember when we spoke last year when I was at CrookedCon, you mentioned you haven't spoken to any Republican secretaries of state. Has that changed at all? Have you started to hear from Republicans being like, this is kind of crazy? I mean, obviously, I'd love to hear that you had, but I'm just curious.

Yeah, look, we have a president who's trying to choose his voters instead of voters choose in the elected. And that basis is really making people frustrated. But in conversations with other Republicans across the state, I have a Republican governor, you know, understanding that what his perception is of our elections and having him say statements publicly that, hey, the states should run elections, not the federal government. No, I'm not in favor of having federal agents at polling locations because that doesn't help our voter base. And that is not a good thing for Nevada. But I think when you see Republican secretaries of state stand up, it's most recently in our U.S. Supreme Court case. Seven of them got together and filed an amicus brief to say the Postal Service should not do what they're doing because it is going to disrupt our elections.

And it is harmful to Americans who want to participate in our elections. So the fact that they did that is a really strong moment of time to say, hey, it's almost one of those moments of a profile and courage of saying, we have to stand. up, we have to do what's right. And the fact that they did that is real leadership. Secretary Aguilar, thank you so much for joining me. Thank you for having me. That was my conversation with Nevada Secretary of State, Cisco Aguilar. Before we go, let's break the cycle on bad leadership. When we're in charge, now out in paperback, is a vital resource for anyone trying to figure

out how to get stuff done without making everyone, including ourselves, miserable. Unlike some people we know. Amanda Littman, executive and co-founder of Run for Something, offers a vision for the future where leaders are effective, compassionate, and genuine. It can be done. She's drawing on conversations with more than 100 next generation leaders at Snap, Teen Vogue, and even Congress. Check out Cricket Media Reeds to learn more about when we're in charge. That's all for today. If you like the show, make sure to subscribe, leave a review.

Pour one out for the Kid Rock Mega Festival that never was. and tell your friends to listen. And if you're into reading, and not just about the Patriots Day Freedom Fest, which was supposed to be a giant free celebration of all things MAGA, but got canceled after just six people bought $1,000 VIP tickets, like me, what a day is also a nightly newsletter.

Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe. I'm Jane Koston, and sure, you're thinking about the festival only attracting six VIP ticket buyers. I'm thinking, who the hell were those six VIP ticket buyers willing to spend a grand on Kid Rock? What Today is a production of Crooked Media. Our show is produced by Emily Ford, Erica Morrison, and Adrian Hill. Our team includes Haley Jones, Greg Walters, Metberg, Adam Lippurg, Johanna Case, and Desmond Taylor. Our music is by Kyle Murdoch and Jordan Cantor.

We had helped today from the Associated Press. Our production staff is proudly unionized for the Writers Guild of America East. I'm Nate Silver. I'm Gaylon Druk. And I'm Claire Malone. We're back, this time with our friends at Crooked Media for a new show called Still Counting. Yeah. Numbers are hard.

It takes her easy. And frankly, numbers have only gotten harder. What does the data actually say? How do we reconcile that with the other things that we're seeing in American politics and around the world? And how do we use that data to understand or maybe even dare to predict the future of American politics? New episodes every Wednesday starting September 9th. Subscribe to Still Counting on New York. YouTube.com slash at Still Counting Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.