President Donald Trump says his tweet that suggested delaying the November election resulted in reporters “finally” starting to talk about the alleged risks posed by mail-in voting.
On Thursday morning, Trump took to Twitter to claim that the 2020 election would be the “most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history.”
Additionally, he suggested that the election should be postponed until Americans could vote in person without risking exposure to COVID-19, as IJR reported.
After hours backlash to that suggestion, Trump tweeted, “Glad I was able to get the very dishonest LameStream Media to finally start talking about the RISKS to our Democracy from dangerous Universal Mail-In-Voting (not Absentee Voting, which I totally support!).”
“Must know Election results on the night of the Election, not days, months, or even years later!” he added.
Glad I was able to get the very dishonest LameStream Media to finally start talking about the RISKS to our Democracy from dangerous Universal Mail-In-Voting (not Absentee Voting, which I totally support!).
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 30, 2020
Must know Election results on the night of the Election, not days, months, or even years later!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 30, 2020
During a press conference on Thursday, Trump was asked if he wanted to delay the election. He responded, “Do I want to see a date change? No.”
Instead, Trump appeared to claim he sent the tweets to bring attention to his concern that mail-in voting would lead to the election being “rigged.” He also claimed that mail-in ballots would make it easier foreign countries to interfere in the election because he claim operatives could forge ballots.
Watch the video below:
President Trump on delaying election: "Do I want to see a date change? No. But I don't want to see a crooked election. This election will be the most rigged election in history if that happens."
— CSPAN (@cspan) July 30, 2020
Full video here: https://t.co/VehtP8NiTF pic.twitter.com/KZNzrhAeVe
Despite Trump’s claim that mail-in voting poses a risk of massive voter fraud, there is no evidence that expanding access to mail-in ballots would lead to massive fraud.
After his tweet, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) responded to his suggestion by sharing the clause in the Constitution that gives Congress the power to set the election day date, as IJR reported.
Several Republican senators also flatly rejected the idea, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) who said, “Never in the history of the country, through wars, depressions and the Civil War have we ever not had a federally scheduled election on time and we’ll find a way to do that again this Nov. 3rd.”
“We’ll cope with whatever the situation is and have the election on Nov. 3rd as already scheduled,” he added.