For many years, millions of American voters have cast ballots through the mail without incident. Secure systems were created in red states and blue states alike; the public found the practice convenient; the process has long featured reliable safeguards; and even the most ardent election conspiracy theorists struggled to uncover any meaningful evidence of fraud or irregularities.
Donald Trump has nevertheless convinced himself that postal balloting is a national scourge that needs to be dramatically curtailed.
Touting the Republicans’ needlessly regressive SAVE America Act, which cleared the House this week, the president said at an unrelated White House event on Thursday, “There would be no mail-in ballots. Very important. You know, we’re the only country in the world that does a system like we do. We’re the only country in the world that has mail-in ballots. The way we do this is unbelievable. It guarantees cheating.”
So, a few things.
First, I have no idea how Trump came to believe that voting by way of the mail is inherently corrupt. It’s not, and he has never offered anything resembling evidence to the contrary. He just keeps asserting the falsehood, apparently hoping that nonsense will become true by way of repetition.
If the president ever uncovers anything to bolster his claim, he’s welcome to present his findings to the public. In the meantime, however, his assertions are impossible to believe.
Second, the idea that no other country allows its citizens to vote through the mail is ridiculously untrue. Around the world, many countries, including longtime democracies with advanced economies, rely on postal balloting without incident.
Third, Republican Party officials, at both the state level and national level, have practically begged Trump to stop lying about this because they want the GOP base to take advantage of mail-in voting. The more the president pushes these false claims, the more his followers believe him, which in turn creates problem for Republicans.
Finally, the American mainstream appears to have already made up its mind: A Pew Research Center poll last summer found that a 58% majority of Americans favor allowing any voter to cast their ballot by mail if they want to.
It’s not exactly a secret that the Republican White House wants to make it harder for Americans to participate in their own democracy. But if the president wants to sound coherent on the subject, he’ll have to do better than this.
