Is voter fraud a problem in the US?

Short answer: No — extensive research shows voter fraud is extremely rare in the U.S., not a widespread problem

This is a well-studied topic, and the empirical evidence is remarkably consistent across decades of research from multiple institutions, including some conducted at the request of Republican administrations.

What the data shows:

Multiple large-scale studies have quantified how rare fraud actually is. One comprehensive report reviewed elections studied for voter fraud and found incident rates between 0.0003 percent and 0.0025 percent, concluding an American is more likely to be struck by lightning than to impersonate another voter at the polls.

A widely cited analysis found that a comprehensive 2014 study published in The Washington Post found 31 credible instances of impersonation fraud from 2000 to 2014, out of more than 1 billion ballots cast. Notably, even this tiny number is likely inflated, as the study's author counted not just prosecutions or convictions, but any and all credible claims.

Another major study looked specifically at states where fraud concerns were highest: two studies done at Arizona State University, one in 2012 and another in 2016, found similarly negligible rates of impersonation fraud, with the follow-up study finding zero successful prosecutions for impersonation fraud in five states from 2012–2016.

Specific categories of alleged fraud:

The 2020 election specifically:

Despite extensive legal challenges, senior officials in the Trump administration, including Attorney General Bill Barr and chief cybersecurity official Chris Krebs, confirmed that no significant fraud was present. Courts agreed: judges appointed by Donald Trump, along with others, reached the conclusion there was not widespread ballot fraud and the election was not stolen, and of 62 lawsuits filed, only one succeeded before being overturned by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

Looking across all of U.S. history:

A database search of billions of ballots cast over 40 years of US elections found roughly 1,000 individual examples of voter fraud. The consensus conclusion: the amount of voter fraud in the United States is not zero, but it is very close to zero, and multiple safeguards, transparencies, and verification systems in place ensure that voter fraud will remain both small in scale and rare.

An interesting gap between perception and reality:

Despite this evidence, public concern remains high. Six in ten U.S. adults were concerned or very concerned about voter fraud ahead of the 2024 presidential election, with this fear particularly pronounced among Republican-leaning voters at 86 percent, versus 55 percent of Independents and just 33 percent of Democratic-leaning voters.

Bottom line: While isolated instances of fraud do occur — and are prosecuted when discovered — no credible, nonpartisan study has found evidence of fraud occurring at a scale that could meaningfully affect election outcomes, let alone constitute a systemic "problem." The debate over voter fraud remains politically contentious, but the empirical research itself is unusually consistent across studies conducted by researchers and institutions across the political spectrum.