Welcome to The Ballot Bulletin: Ballotpedia’s Weekly Digest on Election Administration. Every Friday, we deliver the latest updates on election policy around the country, including nationwide trends and recent legislative activity. 

In this week’s Ballot Bulletin, we cover 27 bills state legislatures acted on in the past week.

Weekly highlights

The big takeaways from the past week’s legislative actions. 

Lawmakers in five states acted on 27 bills over the last week, 12 more than last week. Eleven state legislatures are still in regular or special sessions. 

• No bills were enacted this week. No bills were enacted during the same week in 2024, two were enacted in 2023, and three were enacted in 2022.
• Legislators acted on 29 bills in 2024 and 18 in 2023 during the same week. 
• Twenty-two of the bills acted on this week are in states with Democratic trifectas, two are in states with Republican trifectas, and three are in states with a divided government.  
• The most active bill categories this week were election types and contest-specific procedures (8), voter registration and list maintenance (3), and legal conflicts and litigation (3). 
• We are currently following 4,705 bills. At this time in 2023, the last odd year when all states held legislative sessions, we were following 2,892 bills.

In the news

A glance at what’s making headlines in the world of election law.

• On Aug. 20, the Michigan House of Representatives passed HB4707, a bill that would ban ranked-choice voting in the state. The bill now heads to the Michigan Senate for consideration.
• On Aug. 20, the Texas House of Representatives voted 88-52 along party lines to approve a new congressional district map. The legislation now heads to the Texas Senate. Click here to learn more about redistricting in Texas.
• On Aug. 20, the California Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit seeking to halt the Legislature from proceeding with legislation to revise the state’s congressional districts. The court said the four Republican legislators who filed the lawsuit earlier this week “have failed to meet their burden of establishing a basis for relief at this time under California Constitution article IV, section 8.”
• On Aug. 15, the Joint Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Committee of the Wyoming State Legislature voted to allow the introduction of three election-related bills in the legislative budget session next year. The bills would prohibit ballot drop boxes, require counties to use paper ballots, and revise the definition of qualified elector. The latter bill would clarify Wyoming’s voter registration law, enacted earlier this year, which requires proof of state residency and U.S. citizenship to register.

Key movements

A look at what bills are moving and where. 

No bills were enacted in the past week. No bills were enacted during the same week in 2024, two were enacted in 2023, and three were enacted in 2022. To see all enacted bills, click here.

No bills passed both chambers of a state legislature. To see the full list of all bills awaiting gubernatorial action, click here.

No bills were vetoed in the past week. Seventy bills have been vetoed so far this year. No bills were vetoed during this period in 2024, 2023, or 2022. To see all vetoed bills, click here.

The big picture

Zooming out to see the macro-level trends in election policy so far this year. 

Enacted bills

No bills were enacted this week. The chart below shows the number of enacted bills in 2025 compared to previous years.

The chart below shows the number of bills enacted over the first 33 weeks of each year.

All bills

We are following 4,705 election-related bills this year, including bills carried over from the previous year. 

• Trifecta status
  • Democratic: 1,754 (37.3%)
  • Republican: 2,172 (46.2%) 
  • Divided: 779 (16.6%) 

• Partisan sponsorship
  • Democratic: 1,807 (38.4%)
  • Republican: 2,273 (48.3%)
  • Bipartisan: 403 (8.6%)
  • Other: 222 (4.7%)

We were following 2,892 bills at this point in 2023. Below is a breakdown of those bills by trifecta status and partisan sponsorship.

• Trifecta status
  • Democratic: 1,518 (52.5%)
  • Republican: 942 (32.6%) 
  • Divided: 432 (14.9%) 

• Partisan sponsorship
  • Democratic: 1,333 (46.1%)
  • Republican: 1,063 (36.7%)
  • Bipartisan: 328 (11.3%)
  • Other: 168 (5.8%)

See the charts below for a comparison of total bills between 2023 and 2025 and a breakdown of all 2025 legislation by trifecta status and partisan sponsorship.