IMAGINE THE US GOVERNMENT declared part of our critical national security infrastructure at risk — then offered barely $1 million per state last year to protect it. That’s not a hypothetical. That’s the reality of how we fund elections in America. 

Our elections are the backbone of our democracy. They’ve been formally designated as critical infrastructure, alongside our power grid and water supply. Yet we treat them as an afterthought in our budgets. The system we rely on to uphold the will of the people — to choose presidents, governors, mayors — operates on shoestring funding, especially at the local level where the work of democracy actually happens. 

American elections are intentionally decentralized, with local governments playing the central role. This design keeps elections close to voters and makes large-scale interference harder. But decentralized doesn’t need to mean underfunded. We can have locally run elections and provide the consistent, predictable funding needed to ensure they are free, fair, and secure. 

Elections are so decentralized that we don’t even know precisely how many election jurisdictions exist in the United States. Estimates range from 8,000 to 10,000 — a 25 percent spread that underscores just how fragmented and opaque our system has become.  

Small rural jurisdictions make up most of our electoral system — according to the MIT Election Lab 75 percent of jurisdictions serve just 8 percent of voters — and they are especially vulnerable. In the small Franklin County town of Buckland in Western Mass., with fewer than 1,400 registered voters, the clerk has to conduct her own outside fundraising if she wants to offer food for poll workers or create professional signs to direct voters to the polling location.  

Despite the vital role elections play in sustaining our democracy, the amount America invests in them falls short. MIT estimates it costs $4 to $6 billion annually to run elections properly nationwide — yet that’s about what the federal government has contributed in total over the past 20 years. 

After the 2000 Bush v. Gore recount exposed glaring weaknesses in our voting technology, Congress responded with the Help America Vote Act of 2002, delivering a much-needed injection of $1.5 billion — including $650 million to replace outdated voting machines. But since then, federal funding has been sporadic, reactionary, and far below what’s needed. In recent years, Congress has appropriated just $75 million in 2022 and 2023, and $55 million in 2024 — barely more than $1 million per state. 

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts alone spent the same as the federal government during the 2024 election cycle — but still less than one-tenth of one percent of the state’s overall budget.

​That funding helps cover critical statewide needs like ballot printing and early voting, easing the burden on local officials. Like elsewhere in the country, towns in Massachusetts need to cover the most expensive items like salaries and equipment. That forces small town clerks in places like Buckland – where the annual election budget is just $10,200, or about 0.1 percent of the town’s budget – to be creative to cover basic costs. Nationally, the picture is similar: in the 36 states where counties run elections, elections receive on average around 0.5 percent of county budgets. 

The Edward M. Kennedy Institute and the Robert J. Dole Institute recently convened a bipartisan group of 20 election experts and practitioners and they confirmed: the backbone of our democracy rests on underfunded electoral jurisdictions. They pointed to the dramatic growth in demands on election officials. Now they must manage cybersecurity risks, defend against misinformation, handle record levels of public information requests, and even deal with threats and harassment. All this, with shrinking resources. 

Local election administrators — many part-time, juggling multiple roles — are on the front lines of defending our democracy. In Buckland, for example, the town clerk isn’t just the chief elections officer; she also handles licenses, parking tickets, and more. We are asking these officials to protect a national security asset — our elections — without giving them the tools to succeed. 

It doesn’t have to be this way. We can continue to run elections locally while providing consistent funding, uniform minimum standards, and the resources necessary for security and integrity. It is time for Congress to expand national security expenditures to consistently bolster elections infrastructure. Our democracy depends on it. 

Adam Hinds is CEO of the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate.