The president’s shift on mail-in voting comes as new data indicates his assault on the practice may backfire on him come November.
| Aug 4, 2020
Politico – President Donald Trump on Tuesday reversed his opposition to mail-in voting and encouraged it — at least in one crucial battleground state — after railing against the practice for months amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“Whether you call it Vote by Mail or Absentee Voting, in Florida the election system is Safe and Secure, Tried and True,” Trump wrote in a tweet. “Florida’s Voting system has been cleaned up (we defeated Democrats attempts at change), so in Florida I encourage all to request a Ballot & Vote by Mail! #MAGA”
The tweet represented a remarkable change in tune for the president, who has himself voted by mail but has aggressively pushed voters to head to the polls in person this fall despite fears of spreading the coronavirus.
Trump has repeatedly leveled unsubstantiated claims that voting by mail would result in widespread voter fraud and that the practice would ultimately benefit Democrats.
Despite Trump’s insistence to the contrary, cases of election fraud in the U.S. are exceedingly rare, though experts acknowledge that there are some slightly higher fraud risks associated with mail-in balloting when proper security measures are not put in place.
Just last week, Trump floated delaying November’s election until it was safer to do so in person, a suggestion he is not constitutionally empowered to enact. Trump suggested moving Election Day because an influx in mail-in voting, a practice many have advocated to avoid spreading the coronavirus at polling places, would lead to a “rigged” election that would amount to the “greatest election disaster in history.”
On Monday the president claimed the right to issue an executive order pertaining to his concerns about mail-in voting, another legally dubious proposition, and pledged to sue Nevada over its plans to mail ballots to all registered voters … Read more.
