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US President Donald Trump on Thursday renewed his call for supporters to try to vote twice on November 3, a potentially illegal act that he says is the only way to ensure a ballot is counted. .
Trump said Americans should first try to vote by mail, if that option is offered in their state, then also go to the polling station on Election Day to verify that their ballot has been counted, and if not, vote again.
“NOW YOU ARE SURE THAT YOUR PRECIOUS VOTE HAS BEEN COUNTED,” he said in a Twitter thread.
Voting twice on purpose is illegal.
Facebook and Twitter, which are under increasing pressure not to allow misinformation ahead of the election, put warning labels on the president’s posts on the matter.
“We placed a public interest notice in two Tweets in this thread for violating our Civic Integrity Policy, specifically to encourage people to vote twice,” Twitter said.
However, White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany said Trump had been taken out of context and only wanted voters to verify that their first vote had been recorded.
He “does not approve of illegal voting,” he said.
Whatever Trump meant, the tweets were his latest attack on the credibility of voting by mail, which is rapidly spreading across the country in response to fears of Covid-19 contagion in crowded polling stations.
Despite Trump’s relentless challenges, the practice of mailing is already widespread and largely without problems in the United States.
He uses the absentee mail option himself to vote in Florida while living in the White House.
While Trump says increased voting by mail will allow for massive ballot manipulation and outcome manipulation, election experts say there is no evidence of significant danger.
Yet polls show that Democrats are much more likely than Republicans to vote by mail, leading Trump’s opponents to fear he is trying to suppress Biden’s vote, or setting the stage to dispute the results.
Trump first put forward the idea to cast a second preemptive vote on Wednesday during a trip to North Carolina.
“If you get the unsolicited ballots, send them in and then go, make sure it’s counted. And if it’s not tabulated, you vote,” he said. “So, send it in early and then go vote.”
The recommendation prompted the state board of elections, which Democrat Joe Biden hopes to wrest from Trump, to issue a statement stating: “It is illegal to vote twice in one election.”
“Asking someone to do it is also a violation of North Carolina law,” added board director Karen Brinson Bell.
Polls currently show Biden on track to defeat Trump.
But experts warn that the country faces a confusing and potentially tense aftermath of the November 3 vote, due to unusual circumstances.
Given the higher-than-normal number of ballots mailed, few expect a clear result that night, and that mailed ballots will likely take days, if not weeks, to finish counting.
Under one scenario, Trump could be shown to win based on ballots cast during the day, but mail-in ballots, once counted days later, would put Biden on top.
Trump has repeatedly refused to declare that he will accept the election results.
sms / dw
