Amy Miller’s work helps ensure that elderly and disabled people in Nebraska can participate in elections. The Disability Rights Nebraska attorney travels across the state investigating nursing homes and assisted living facilities while also offering residents voter registration forms.

Last month, Miller helped a veteran with a traumatic brain injury complete change of address paperwork for the upcoming midterm elections. “He 100% knew who he wanted to vote for,” Miller said, but writing with a pen was difficult for him.

Congress funds efforts by Miller’s organization to help people who may lack internet access or transportation exercise their voting rights. A White House proposal now threatens that work by seeking to restrict how federal grant money can be used.

The White House Office of Management and Budget wants federal spending rules to prohibit grant recipients from conducting voter registration drives or vaguely defined “related activities.” The office is led by Russell Vought, who has criticized taxpayer funding for voter registration and used his position to cancel, freeze or redirect federal money despite congressional directives.

Miller, who has spent six years at the nonprofit, said she had never encountered regulators seeking to impede its work. “Shutting that down and making it more difficult for these Americans to access the ballot box is bewildering to me,” she said.

The proposal fits within the Trump administration’s broader attack on federal efforts to increase voting access, particularly for groups that have experienced discrimination and disenfranchisement. President Donald Trump has championed the SAVE America Act, which would require citizenship documents during registration and may require people to provide them in person.

Such an in person requirement could effectively end voter registration drives. The administration also banned nongovernmental organizations from holding registration drives at naturalization ceremonies last year, although the responsible agency temporarily suspended that ban during litigation.

The Department of Education separately told colleges and universities they could not use federal work study dollars for voting related work, a directive that has been contested. Those funds previously paid students working part time to conduct voter registration on campuses and in surrounding communities.

On the first day of his second term, Trump rescinded an executive order from Joe Biden directing federal agencies to expand registration opportunities. Biden’s order recognized that Black citizens, people with disabilities and other Americans face historic and continuing obstacles to voting access.

Neither Vought nor his office responded to ProPublica’s questions. In a 2022 letter to state officials, however, Vought called Biden’s order a “power grab” that would “increase voter registration and turnout, especially among Democratic Party supporters.”

Vought’s proposed rule would not take effect until after the 2026 midterms, but nonprofit experts said its reach could extend into the next presidential election. Confusion about which organizations are covered, combined with the burden of proving compliance, could cause groups to reduce or suspend registration work before 2028.

Disability focused nonprofits could face the most direct consequences. “I don’t really think this rule had in mind that we are going to disenfranchise voters with disabilities. But it’s going to have that kind of effect,” said Rabia Belt, a Stanford law professor specializing in disability and citizenship.

Congress created grants supporting voter registration, ballot access and accessible polling places through the 2002 Help America Vote Act. In recent years, lawmakers have budgeted $10 million annually among 57 nonprofit groups serving every state, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, Native American communities and U.S. territories.

A Rutgers University report found that this funding narrowed the voting gap between people with disabilities and those without disabilities. Yet during the 2024 election, 3.6% of registered voters with disabilities reported registration difficulties, compared with 1.4% of registered voters without disabilities, representing about 740,000 registered voters with disabilities.

The Office of Management and Budget published its draft proposal in May as part of a larger rewrite of federal grant rules. Legal experts said the final rule will almost certainly face litigation, including challenges alleging that it conflicts with existing laws and grant programs repeatedly approved by Congress.

Samuel Bagenstos, a former Office of Management and Budget general counsel during the Biden administration, said the plan disregards Congress’ constitutional “power of the purse.” “This is not even a surgical power grab,” he said. “It’s just a massive across-the-board power grab.”

Disability Rights Nebraska received $141,000 in voter accessibility funding this year and submitted a public comment opposing the proposal. During a June visit to a rural assisted living facility, 30% of new registrants identified as Republican, 20% as Democrat and 50% as nonpartisan or affiliated with a third party.

Miller said the organization’s work is legally required to remain nonpartisan, with staff conducting drives in pairs representing different parties. Recalling residents who discovered they could register again, she said, “I wish they could see that and realize how important the work is.”