Trump's crusade against voting by mail: what you need to know

And yet, with the crucial midterms less than seven weeks away, the U.S. Supreme Court has halted a Trump administration plan that could have denied millions the chance to cast mail-in ballots. Here's what you need to know.

Tens of millions of Americans use mail-in ballots to vote in both presidential and midterm elections.

The proportion of Americans voting by mail increased gradually through the 2010s to reach 25 per cent in 2018, then spiked to 43 per cent in 2020 with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

About 30 per cent of the 158 million votes cast in the 2024 presidential election were mail-in ballots, according to the official report by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission.

These figures are all far higher than the proportion voting by mail in federal elections in Canada.