He has been adjusting his rhetoric over the past few weeks. It is not only “mail-in” voting that he is now against, but rather, as he has put it, “universal mail-in-voting.” During a press conference last week, he explained why he is all for absent votes, but opposed post-in-votes:
“Voting is great. You’re requesting – I’m an absentee voter because I asked, I got it, and then I put my vote in. That’s working very well. That’s what we had. But now they want to. send in millions and millions of votes. “
“Universal voting will be disastrous. It will make our country laugh all over the world. You can not send millions of votes.”
But here’s the thing. A lot of absent votes (mostly!) Are done by mail. An absent vote is a vote outside the ballot box, traditionally for very specific and limited reasons. There has been some version of absentee voting by mail since the Civil War, when troops voting from the battlefield helped Abraham Lincoln win reelection.
It has worked so well that several states have moved to all mail-in delivery systems, where they automatically send votes to all registered voters. Oregon is the classic example of “universal mail-in vote”, because mail-in-vote is all they do.
The difference, as it seems to exist in Trump’s sense, seems to be between states that conduct their elections primarily by mail and those that require voters to ask for a vote to be submitted by mail.
Trump says automatically sending e-mail votes to all registered voters is BAD. But asking for your email vote is GOOD. The first system is often called “universal e-mail voting” or “all-mail” election. The second system is called “absent votes” and can be “no apology” if no apology is needed.
That represents a 10-point increase over the share that voted by mail in 2016: 24%, according to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission.
There are 50 US states and in 42 of them, for this year anyone who wants to can vote by mail.
Here are the details, according to CNN’s political unit:
- Eight states, in addition to Washington, DC, will hold primary primary by-election in November (CA *, CO, DC *, HI, NV *, OR, UT, VT *, WA)
- 34 states allow voters to request an e-mail vote with no apology (AL *, AK, AR *, AZ, CT *, DE *, FL, GA, ID, IL *, IA *, KS, ME, MA * , MD, MI *, MN, MO *, MT, NE, NH *, NJ, NM, NC, ND, OH *, OK, PA, RI, SD, VA, WV *, WI, WY)
- Eight states require an apology to vote by mail (IN, KY, LA, MS, NY, SC, TN *, TX)
Asterisks indicate that a change was made due to coronavirus.
This is a good place to add the fact that each state governs its own electoral rules. That one is not really talking about universal post-in-votes for the whole country, although you can imagine Democrats supporting the idea. Several states changed election rules during the pandemic and made it easier to vote absent, by mail.
Trump acknowledged the lack of a distinction between postal voting and absenteeism earlier this month when he encouraged Floridians – people living in a state he thinks he can win – to vote by post.
“Whether you call it a Vote by Post or an Absentee Voting, in Florida the Electoral System is Safe and Secure, Tried and True. The Florida Voting System has been cleaned up (we defeated Democrats are trying to change that), so in Florida I encourage everyone to request a vote and vote by mail! #MAGA “
That’s where you go. Call it what you will. Just vote. And to make this work smooth, vote fast.
In fact, Trump is likely to cast his absent presidential election in Florida. We know this because he voted Tuesday, absent, and in the Florida Congress primary. He will do it. He just does not want everyone to do it. But instead of sending it, he sends it through someone else who has signed a confirmation.
And look for the next border to be a fight over how absent ballots can be collected, if not by mail. Sometimes third parties – organizations or political parties – will collect sealed ballots. The practice, known as polling collection as “harvesting,” is not legal in every state. It is also the heart of GOP suspicions about voting via mail-in.
Increased access to absentee ballots in Nevada is currently the subject of a battle over ballot box.
CNN’s Marshall Cohen contributed to this report.
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