President Donald Trump on Thursday floated the idea of delaying the Nov. 3 presidential election; something the president of the United States can’t change.
This is the tweet that had everyone talking:
With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history. It will be a great embarrassment to the USA. Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 30, 2020
Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Florida, said in response, “I wish he hadn’t said that, but it’s not going to change. We are going to have an election in November and people should have confidence in it.”
He is one of many Republicans reacting to President Trump’s latest eye-raising tweet.
“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,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tennessee, questioned whether the president had thought his tweet all the way through.
“I think that the president’s term and the vice president’s term expires on January 20, and if we were to delay the election past January 20, the president would be the speaker of the House,” Alexander said.
Speaking at Rep. John Lewis’s funeral in Atlanta, former President Barack Obama implicitly addressed his successor’s policies on voting.
“There are those in power doing their darnedest to discourage people from voting by closing polling locations and targeting minorities and students with restrictive ID laws and attacking our voting rights with surgical precision, even undermining the postal service in the run up to an election that’s going to be dependent on mail-in ballots so people don’t get sick,” Obama said.
In an evening fundraiser with top Black congressional leaders, former Vice President Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, blasted President Trump’s suggestion of a delay.
“This has got to be a wakeup call,” Biden said. “It’s time to respond with purpose, action and commitment. Because this election isn’t just about voting against Donald Trump. It’s about working to understand people’s struggles. It’s about all our families.”
News4Jax spoke with Mike Hogan, the Duval County supervisor of elections. He said, ““We will do our best for voters to ensure a good and accurate election. But there is evidence that among the methods to vote, vote-by-mail offers the least reliability and security. It certainly can’t compete with having a live person in front of you with a valid ID.”
So far, at least six states have confirmed that they will send mail ballot request forms to voters, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU’s Law School. New Mexico has passed legislation so that county clerks may send such forms to voters. California and Vermont will mail ballots to all active registered voters. In roughly three dozen states and the District of Columbia, officials may not send request forms or ballots to all voters for November.
The Associated Press contributed to this report