Trump Again Admits He's Against Mail-In Voting Because It'd Be Bad For Republicans

Despite a growing call to shift elections to be conducted wholly by mail, President Donald Trump has continued to push back against the idea. In a Wednesday tweet, Trump provided some insight into why that might be: Voting by mail would be bad for Republicans.

Trump tweeted that “Republicans should fight very hard” to curb the push for widespread mail-in voting, citing “tremendous potential for voter fraud, and for whatever reason, doesn’t work out well for Republicans.”

This echoes remarks he made last week during an interview on Fox News, in which Trump said that if mail-in voting became more widely used “you would never have a Republican elected in this country again.”

Trump’s push back against voting by mail has remained firm, though he has generally argued that his stance is out of concern about voter fraud – though his surprisingly candid remarks about Republican electability suggest there may be more to it.

On Tuesday, despite his opposition to voting by mail, the president admitted that he, as a registered Florida voter, had participated in the primary last month by mailing in his ballot.

Trump’s remarks come amid a battle over how elections should be conducted during the Covid-19 pandemic. Many Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., have already voiced their strong support to have states establish or expand their mail-in voting systems.

Democrats on the Hill previously pushed to have $2 billion of the $2.2 billion stimulus set aside to help states in this regard; these provisions, however, were eventually cut almost entirely from the final draft, allocating just $400 million to states for this purpose. Pelosi has since promised the next coronavirus relief bill will be tied firmly to boosting mail-in voting.

Wisconsin’s primary and state vote on Tuesday became a flash point in the battle over voting by mail, as Democrats sought to have polling postponed out of public health concerns. Republicans continued to oppose this push, ultimately ensuring voting went ahead as scheduled.

With health experts wary that the pandemic will be fully contained by the fall, Democrats like Pelosi believe mail-in voting will simply become “a reality of life” – and without a doubt a major issue both parties will clash over in the coming months.