President Trump is flirting with the idea of postponing the upcoming election in November. He revealed this thought on Twitter on July 30, 2020.
According to The Washington Post, his tweet came after the damning economic report. Trump regularly bragged about his “great” achievement of boosting the economy. However, due to the COVID-19 crisis in the United States and related factors, the economy took a turn for the worse. In fact, today’s announcement indicates the economy shrank by one-third — 32.9 percent. The drop is the largest since the government began publishing economic reports in the last 70 years.
Trump’s further concerns surround the coronavirus and mail-in ballots for the election.
His claims mail-in voting are baseless. Trump contends the use of mail-in ballots will be forged and there is no way to validate the vote will be fraudulent. Moreover, he stated in one of at least 70 negative comments about election fraud include angst over Republican candidates never winning an election.
NPR reports the actuality of mail-in voter fraud:
Over the past 20 years, they write, more than 250 million ballots have been cast by mail nationwide, while there have been just 143 criminal convictions for election fraud related to mail ballots. That averages out to about one case per state every six or seven years, or a fraud rate of 0.00006%.
The president’s COVID-19 claim might be due to the massive-record-breaking increase in reported cases and deaths. Perhaps, he is using the excuse that more people could be infected should they go to the polls election day.
Postponing an election is Constitutional. It takes an act of Congress with both Republicans and Democrats in agreement. So, it is an unlikely scenario, according to NPR.
Written by Cathy Milne-Ware
Sources:
The Washington Post: Trump floats idea of delaying the November election, a power granted to Congress, as he ramps up attacks on voting by mail
The Washington Post: U.S. economy contracted at fastest quarterly rate on record from April to June as coronavirus walloped workers, businesses
NPR: Why Is Voting By Mail (Suddenly) Controversial? Here’s What You Need To Know
NPR: Trump Floats Delaying The Election. It Would Require A Change In Law
Featured Image Courtesy of Robert Stinnentt’s Flickr Page – Creative Commons License
