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 355 bills state legislatures acted on in the past week.
Weekly highlights
The big takeaways from the past week’s legislative actions.
Lawmakers in 34 states acted on 355 bills over the last week, 154 fewer than last week.
- Thirteen bills were enacted this week. Thirteen bills were enacted during the same week in 2024, 24 bills were enacted in 2023, and eight bills were enacted in 2022.
- Legislators acted on 138 bills in 2024, 158 in 2023, and 108 bills in 2022 during the same week.
- Sixty of the bills acted on this week are in states with Democratic trifectas, 237 are in states with Republican trifectas, and 58 are in states with a divided government.
- The most active bill categories this week were election types and contest-specific procedures (98), campaign finance (97), and voter registration and list maintenance (56).
- We are currently following 4,373 bills. At this time in 2023, the last odd year when all states held legislative sessions, we were following 2,433 bills.
Note: In some states, legislators are able to file hundreds of bills per day. We are actively reviewing those bills to determine their relevance to election administration. As a result, during this period of heightened legislative activity, year-to-year comparisons may not yet account for all relevant bills introduced in 2025.
In the news
A glance at what’s making headlines in the world of election law.
- On April 24, the Indiana General Assembly passed SB0287, a bill allowing school board candidates to run under party labels. Indiana’s school board elections were previously nonpartisan. Four states, Alabama, Connecticut, Louisiana, and Pennsylvania, allow candidates to use party labels in school board elections. If Gov. Mike Braun (R) signs the bill, it will take effect in July.
- On April 23, a panel of Wake County Superior Court judges blocked a 2024 North Carolina bill that transferred authority over the state’s boards of election from the governor to the state auditor. Gov. Roy Cooper (D) vetoed the bill on Nov. 26, 2024, but the Legislature overrode Cooper’s veto on Dec. 11.
- On April 23, a U.S. district court judge in New Hampshire heard arguments in a lawsuit challenging HB1569, a bill requiring first-time voters to present proof of citizenship to register. Plaintiffs, including the Coalition for Open Democracy and the League of Women Voters, argued that the law disenfranchises eligible voters.
- On April 18, Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs (D) vetoed six election-related bills, including SB1441, which requires school board candidates to have their party affiliation listed on the ballot, and HB2007, which prohibits payment for voter registration forms collected, completed, or submitted. Hobbs has vetoed eight election-related bills this year, which you can view here.
Key movements
A look at what bills are moving and where.
Thirteen bills were enacted in the past week. Thirteen bills were enacted during the same week in 2024, 24 bills were passed in 2023, and eight bills were enacted in 2022. To see all enacted bills, click here.
Fifty-nine bills have passed both chambers of state legislatures. To see the full list of all bills awaiting gubernatorial action, click here.
Governors vetoed five bills in the past week. Twenty bills have been vetoed so far this year. Two bills were vetoed during this period in 2024, one bill was vetoed in 2023, and one bill was vetoed in 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
Thirteen 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 17 weeks of each year.
All bills
We are following 4,373 election-related bills this year, including bills carried over from the previous year.
- Trifecta status
- Democratic: 1,617 (37%)
- Republican: 2,077 (47.5%)
- Divided: 679 (15.5%)
- Partisan sponsorship
- Democratic: 1,676 (38.3%)
- Republican: 2,147 (49.1%)
- Bipartisan: 327 (7.5%)
- Other: 223 (5.1%)
We were following 2,433 bills at this point in 2023. Below is a breakdown of those bills by trifecta status and partisan sponsorship.
- Trifecta status
- Democratic: 1,252 (51.5%)
- Republican: 826 (33.9%)
- Divided: 355 (14.6%)
- Partisan sponsorship
- Democratic: 1,087 (44.7%)
- Republican: 922 (37.9%)
- Bipartisan: 284 (11.7%)
- Other: 140 (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.
