For weeks, Donald Trump has been spreading a conspiracy theory that mail-in ballots are insecure and subject to massive voter fraud. He's even sued Nevada for offering mail-in ballots to all its voters. Despite the fact the commission he established after his election to look into voting irregularities found none and that no one (aside from conspiracy theorists like Kris Kobach who headed the effort) thinks there is any significant problem with voting by mail, he has continued relentlessly to hammer this false narrative. He's also been hard at work to cripple the USPS so that his fear-mongering might actually in the end appear to have been right with long delays in vote counting arising from his defending of the postal service.
His motives, however, seemed clear; he wanted to suppress voting in predominantly Democratic neighborhoods where voting in person was likely to be especially hard, and to be able to challenge the election results if he loses in November by claiming that Biden only won because of fraudulent voting.
And then without batting an eyelid, today he tweets his support for vote-by-mail. If this head-spinning change of course seems astonishing (as it should), I suggest it comes down simply to this. Recent polling may have suggested that his message that voting by mail was a problem may have created a larger voter suppression effect for the GOP and his voters. In particular, Florida has an elderly population and is critical to his reelection. So without his Florida voters turning out, which they might fear to do, given the covid situation, his opposition to mail-in ballots was hurting him. So, about-face, quick march in the other direction.
What's really astonishing about this story is that he doesn't think people will remember that only 24 hours ago he was saying (as he had been for weeks) exactly the opposite.
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