Six keys to understand Trump's unprecedented proposal to suspend the elections

07/31/2020 - 12:31

• Clarín.com
• World

The unprecedented proposal of Donald Trump to postpone the November presidential election continues to talk in the United States . For Trump, the massive implementation of the vote by mail required by the pandemic will lead to the country's "most fraudulent election in history". His "suggestion", which he launched via Twitter, was rejected by politicians from both parties, and became a national debate topic on the networks.

In an attempt to clarify the doubts on the issue, here is a review of the main questions that Trump posed as "dangerous".

Trump said the 2020 election will be "the most fraudulent and unreliable" in history. What evidence is there of this?

Time and again, electoral fraud has been shown to be extremely rare. Casting the vote without going to the polls has become more common.

In fact, Trump's victory in the 2016 presidential election came just as the trend to stop voting in person was at its peak . Trump himself voted by mail in the Florida Republican primaries.

Multiple instances of control, such as signature verification by many states, must occur before a vote can be counted, and experts say any fraud can be detected .

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 ???

Trump said the mail ballots in the primary election were a "catastrophic disaster. What evidence is there of this?

The coronavirus pandemic disrupted voting in this year's primaries. Some states delayed their elections, and many of them limited the number of polling places in person and urged voters to vote by mail.

The late adjustments caused disorder across the country, though not just with the vote by mail.

Voters in Atlanta, Milwaukee, and Las Vegas, to name a few cities, faced long queues after polling stations consolidated to cope with a drastic decline in poll workers. Election offices, faced with staff and budget constraints, were overwhelmed by an increase in requests for absentee votes.

As states complete their plans for November, many prepare for a vote-by-mail increase that presents new headaches. They will have to add staff to open and process the ballots . The US Post Office must prepare for an increase in deliveries. Some states have had to change procedures on when to count votes. Election officials warn that the count will be slower.

Rather than seeking a delay, election officials are seeking money from the national government. Several have supported the Democrats' effort to include electoral aid in a new virus relief package. The most recent Senate Republican bill has no money for those purposes.

Does Trump have the power to postpone the elections?

It is almost impossible that I can do that . The presidential election date, which is the Tuesday after the first Monday in November of every four years, is enshrined in national law and would require a law by Congress to change it. Democrats, who control the House, will not support Trump in this. It looks like the Republicans won't either.

Following Trump's tweets, Senate Majority Leader Republican Mitch McConnell said that Election Day is unchangeable . Other high-ranking Republicans were just as blunt.

The leader of the majority in the US Senate. Republican Mitch McConnell, was one of those who came out to say that the date of the election was unalterable. / AFP

Why does Trump mention the possibility of delaying the elections?

One possible reason is because he's behind Democrat Joe Biden in the polls. He may be seeking to distract people from the failures of his administration, amid a pandemic that has left more than 150,000 victims in the country, and has wrecked the economy.

Although Trump talks a lot about the danger of fraud, the truth is that he has made it clear that he believes that voting by mail helps Democrats . He was explicit on this point during the coronavirus aid package negotiations in March, when Democrats proposed more money to expand voting by mail in the pandemic.

He said that with the voting levels that aid would encourage, "in this country, there would never be a Republican-elect again."

Does belt voting "make it easier" for foreign countries to interfere in elections?

No. Contrary to Trump's tweet, who stated that "voting by mail is an easy way for foreign countries to stand in the elections," it would be one of the most difficult ways for a foreign adversary to meddle in an election in the United States.

Advocating for a national election using absentee votes would mean paying thousands of carefully selected US citizens in key cities in troubled states who are willing to conspire with a foreign government and risk detection and prosecution.

Much easier and cheaper would be a social media campaign trying to discourage certain groups of people from voting, something the FBI has already warned about. Or launch a sophisticated cyber attack on voter registration data that would wipe out certain voters from the lists, wreaking havoc at polling stations or election offices as officials seek to count the ballots of people who are "disappeared" from their voter databases.

Last month Attorney General Bill Barr raised the possibility that a "foreign country could print tens of thousands of false ballots." He argued that they would be difficult to detect, but that has been disputed by election experts.

Absentee ballots are printed on special paper, and must be properly formatted to be processed and counted. Ballots are district-specific, often with a long list of local races, and would be easily identified as fraudulent if everything didn't match up accurately.

"This is a complete false lead," said Wendy Weiser, director of the Brennan Center for Justice democracy program. "It is not entirely plausible, and it is not something that concerns security and election experts."

Trump said universal voting by mail was a bad thing, and absentee voting was "good." What is the difference?

There is not much difference. Trump is trying to distinguish between the five states that send ballots to all registered voters, and the other states, where voters must request an absentee vote by mail. You are not opposed to absentee voting , which is the process that allows you to vote remotely in Florida.

But in both cases, voters must be registered to obtain a vote, and the actual method of voting is the same: Voters complete the ballot at their convenience before a deadline, and can mail it to their local election office, or leave it in a designated place.

Source: AP