At Donald Trump’s latest event in Memphis, which was ostensibly focused on public safety and the deployment of federal law enforcement resources, the president took some time to focus on one his favorite subjects: his hatred of mail-in voting.

“You know, it was brought to my attention today that we’re the only country that does mail-in voting,” the Republican claimed. “Mail-in voting means mail-in cheating. I call it mail-in cheating.”

As is too often the case, the president had no idea what he was talking about. For one thing, many countries in continents around the globe rely on postal balloting without incident. No matter how many times Trump says the U.S. is the only country that embraces such a system, reality keeps proving him wrong.

For another, I have no idea how Trump came to believe that voting by way of the mail is inherently corrupt, but it’s not, and he’s 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.

So far, it’s not working. A Pew Research Center poll last summer found that a 58% majority of Americans favor allowing voters to cast ballots by mail if they want to. Meanwhile, 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.

But there’s another element to this that’s just as notable: The president who wants to stop Americans from voting by mail also votes by mail. MS NOW reported that the website for the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections shows that Trump voted by mail in this week’s special election in Florida. The Washington Post similarly reported:

President Donald Trump, who is in the midst of pressuring senators to curb the use of mail-in voting, voted by mail ballot in Tuesday’s special election in Palm Beach County, Florida.

The Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections website indicates that Trump, who is registered to vote at his Mar-a-Lago estate on Palm Beach, ‘voted by Mail Ballot’ in a special election between Democrat Emily Gregory and Republican Jon Maples for a seat in the state legislature. A spokesperson for the office confirmed to The Washington Post that the ‘information [on the site] is accurate.’

If this sounds at all familiar, it’s not your imagination. In Trump’s first term, the president also condemned mail-in balloting as “horrible” and “corrupt,” even as he continued to vote by mail.

Pressed on the conflict between his position and his record, the Republican told reporters, “Sure, I can vote by mail — because I’m allowed to.”

Six years later, Trump is still condemning mail-in voting for baseless reasons, he’s still voting by mail himself, and he’s also demanding that congressional Republicans impose new election restrictions that would prevent millions of Americans from doing what he’s done on multiple occasions.

Complicating matters further, there’s the U.S. Supreme Court, which is run by Republican-appointed justices who appear ready to inject needless chaos and uncertainty into elections by barring states from counting ballots that come in after Election Day — even if they’re postmarked by Election Day. Watch this space.

Reporting from MS NOW’s Adam Hudacek contributed to this report.

The post After publicly condemning voting by mail as ‘cheating,’ Trump votes by mail appeared first on MS NOW.

Author: Source Author

From MS Now.