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Donald Trump urges his supporters in North Carolina to vote twice in the US elections. You want to test the voting system with him. The problem: the request is illegal.
Several US states firmly rejected President Donald Trump’s encouragement to double-vote in the November elections as illegal. Twitter also took action against Trump’s remarks. “It’s illegal to vote twice, no matter who encourages it,” Michigan State Attorney General Dana Nessel, Democrat, said in a statement. The North Carolina election authority also said Thursday (local time): “It is illegal to vote twice.” Similar statements came from election officials in California, Colorado, and Arizona, among others.
The North Carolina agency also warned citizens not to go to polling stations on Election Day, contrary to the president’s call, to make sure their mail-in votes are counted correctly. “That is not necessary. It would also lead to longer lines and a possible spread of the coronavirus.” The US states are responsible for conducting the elections.
Each eligible voter has only one vote in the United States
Trump had encouraged postal voters to attempt a double vote. Trump told local broadcaster WECT on Wednesday during a visit to the state of North Carolina that voters by mail should try again to cast their vote at the electoral college. If the postal voting system works as well as its proponents have suggested, “then they won’t be able to,” he said.
The problem: this procedure is illegal in the US, each eligible voter only has one vote. It is also a crime in the state of North Carolina for a person to commit fraud by intentional double registration or double voting. It is also a crime to induce people to vote illegally in an electoral or area code. Under United States federal law, casting more than one vote in a congressional or presidential election could result in a fine of up to $ 10,000 and / or imprisonment for up to five years.
Facebook and Twitter ignite: Trump returns to the ranks
Facebook said in response to Trump’s interview that it violates “the guidelines prohibiting voter fraud and we will remove it unless it is distributed to correct statements.” Trump’s spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany said the president wanted to warn against the possibility of postal vote fraud with his remarks.
On Thursday, Trump backtracked a bit via Twitter, but again asked postal voters to go to polling stations on Election Day. In the event of a problem, citizens must vote again at the site so that no vote is lost, he wrote.
Therefore, Twitter provided two tweets from Trump on the subject with a warning. The tweets violated guidelines to maintain the integrity of the election, the company said. “Our goal is to prevent people from sharing double-voting advice that could be illegal,” he said. Therefore, the tweet could only be distributed to a limited extent. A click on the warning led to the original. It is in the public interest that the tweet is still accessible, he said.
Trump repeatedly criticized postal votes as prone to fraud without giving reasons. So, it was only ten days ago that Twitter tweeted Trump’s alleged election fraud with a warning. Trump has about 86 million followers on Twitter.
Trump’s proposal could create confusion
With the double vote, Donald Trump wants to encourage people to test the electoral system. (Source: AP / dpa)
Trump’s proposal has legal and political implications. “Every state has mechanisms to ensure that a voter cannot cast a vote by mail or a personal vote,” said Richard Pildes, CNN’s electoral law analyst and professor at New York University School of Law. “If your absentee ballot has not yet been received and you appear in person to vote, your personal vote will be counted and your absentee vote will be rejected. However, if your absentee ballot is already recorded, you will be prompted to cast a vote. preliminary ballot. This ballot will not be counted once it has been confirmed that your postal ballot has been received. ” From Pildes’s point of view, Donald Trump’s proposal will cause enormous confusion.
The Minister of Justice has no idea
But that could be exactly the intention behind it, at least thinks Rick Hasen, a professor of law and political science at the University of California-Irvine. “It appears that he proposed a double vote to test the integrity of the system or to ensure that his constituents can cast at least one ballot for him,” Hasen told CNN. Is that a fraudulent intention? It could be because Trump seems to assume that the electoral examiners would not necessarily notice the double vote of his supporters. “
US Attorney General Barr was asked to comment on Trump’s words a little later after Trump’s first comments in a live interview on the CNN news channel. “It seems to me that he is trying to point out that the ways of monitoring the system are not good. And that you will be caught trying to vote a second time if it works well,” Barr said. When asked that it would be illegal to try to vote twice, Barr said, “I don’t know what the law is about in this particular state.”
Due to the ongoing corona pandemic, a massive increase in mail-in votes is expected in the November 3 elections. Voting by mail is generally considered secure and established; in 2016, for example, nearly one in four voters voted by mail.
