Voting is a pillar of American democracy, a constitutional right granted to eligible citizens in the last six years.

Attacks on those rights have come from the highest level of government.

On The Newsfeed, we're concluding our voting series by looking into efforts to weaken our elections.

We talk with Washington's top election administrator, the Attorney General, and legal experts outside the state to understand what is being undercut ahead of the midterms.

-Well, I think what you're seein is a concerted effort from the President and his team to dissuade people from voting.

I mean, I hate to say that, but I think it reflects the reality that in the last 18 months, the President has taken repeated steps to take control of state voting systems to spread a lot of misinformation.

-Washington State Attorney General Nick Brown says the federal government's unprecedented interference is impacting the system.

Just this week, Brown joined 25 other states in suing the United States Postal Service over its rules that could limit the delivery of mailed ballots at the direction of the Trump administration.

Since Trump's 2020 election loss, he's inundated the media with a web of election attacks and untrue claims of voter fraud.

In his second term, he's taken many steps to disrupt the electoral process.

Here are some examples.

Several bipartisan key members of the Election Assistance Commission were fired or resigned.

Demanding and suing states for access to their voter registration rolls.

He issued a March executive order trying to exert control over who can receive mail in ballots, which has been tied up in the courts.

He's dismantled the federal Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.

The Department of Justice overhauled its civil rights division.

Some former officials say it's strayed from its long standing mission of enforcing laws that protect against voter discrimination.

The administration is pushing Congress to pass the SAVE Act, a federal voter ID bill.

UCLA law professor Rick Hasen says in more recent years, Trump has been a big factor in causing more polarization in elections.

-Mistrust in elections is running high.

And it's ironic because it's happening at a time where we've never had elections better run in the United States than we do right now.

-The Trump administration has argued their efforts are to make elections fairer and free of fraud.

One baseless claim, is that non-citizens are voting in U.S.

elections, which Hobbs says has rarely happened.

-We can go look at like 45 years of data showing us that only 15 non-citizens voted, which if you look at the percentages, that's a .000006%.

-In the wake of the Supreme Court's evisceration of the Voting Rights Act with the Louisiana versus Callais case, the Legal Defense Fund says it's weakened voting protections for black and brown people.

Todd Cox, with the LDF, says voters everywhere must pay attention.

-What's happening in the Deep South is as an example of what's going to happen across the country.

The move to do redistricting off cycle is going to continue.

And now Callais will add fuel to that fire.

They will use partisanship as a justification for removing opportunity districts across the board, not just for black people, for all communities of color.

-Hasen says to restore trust in our electoral system, it starts local.

-People tend to trust their local election administrators, the ones who are actually community members, who are employed to tabulate votes and run elections.

-A system up against tremendous pressures across party lines and within its own government, leading up to November's pivotal election that could shift political power in Congress.

-Even though it's under tremendous stress and assault from unfortunately, somebody that represents the top.

-I'm Paris Jackson, thanks for watching.

To see this week's stories on our voting coverage, visit CascadePBS.org/TheNewsfeed