Donald Trump Rails Against Voting By Mail On Twitter, Suggests It Would Be ‘Substantially Fraudulent’
President Donald Trump took to Twitter on Tuesday morning to rail against the process of voting by mail — and against California Governor Gavin Newsom specifically, who plans to expand the process in his state.
In a series of tweets, Trump addressed a topic that’s been on his mind lately: the expansion — or even mere existence of — voting by mail. As previously reported by The Inquisitr, Trump has been adamant for months that voting by mail has the potential to be fraudulent, even going so far as threatening to withhold federal funds from Nevada if the state proceeded with its plans to expand voting by mail. He had previously said that Democrats could use voting by mail to “steal” the election.
On Tuesday, he visited the topic again, this time with his sights on California.
“There is NO WAY (ZERO!) that Mail-In Ballots will be anything less than substantially fraudulent. Mail boxes will be robbed, ballots will be forged & even illegally printed out & fraudulently signed,” he tweeted, noting that Governor Newsom is sending mail-in ballots to every registered voter in California.
In a follow-up tweet, he posited that professionals will tell all of those voters — many of whom he claims have never thought of voting before — how to vote and for whom.
“This will be a Rigged Election. No way!” he tweeted.
On Monday, as USA Today reported, the Republican National Committee (RNC) filed a lawsuit intended to put a halt to California’s plan to extend voting by mail to all voters. California — like Nevada — has been keen on expanding the process in order to allow voters to cast their ballots without having to show up in-person at polling places, which would potentially expose poll workers and other voters to the coronavirus.
Republicans claimed in their lawsuit that the virus is a thin excuse to open up the voting process to fraud.
“Democrats continue to use this pandemic as a ploy to implement their partisan election agenda… Newsom’s illegal power grab is a recipe for disaster that would destroy the confidence Californians deserve to have in the security of their vote,” RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel in a statement.
All 50 states allow voting by mail, although the process is more tightly controlled in some states than others. For example, in some states, every voter is sent a mail-in ballot by default, while in others a voter has to ask. Some, like Missouri, require the voter to provide a valid reason for needing a mail-in ballot, such as planning to be out of the state on Election Day, while others issue a mail-in ballot to any voter who requests one, without requiring a reason.
