Trump cruises on caps lock to claim mail-in voting will 'LEAD TO THE END' for Republicans
by David Choi- President Donald Trump cruised on caps lock in a tweet to fuel his unfounded allegations that "MAIL-IN VOTING WILL LEAD TO MASSIVE FRAUD AND ABUSE."
- "IT WILL ALSO LEAD TO THE END OF OUR GREAT REPUBLICAN PARTY," Trump claimed.
- Despite the Trump administration's alarming characterization of voter and mail-in voting fraud, real-life cases have been scant.
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President Donald Trump cruised on caps lock in a tweet on Thursday evening to fuel his unfounded allegations that "MAIL-IN VOTING WILL LEAD TO MASSIVE FRAUD AND ABUSE."
In his tweet, Trump exclaimed that voting by mail would contribute to the demise of the Republican Party and become a boon for Democrats, despite evidence to the contrary.
"IT WILL ALSO LEAD TO THE END OF OUR GREAT REPUBLICAN PARTY," Trump claimed. "WE CAN NEVER LET THIS TRAGEDY BEFALL OUR NATION."
As the US nears the 2020 US presidential election in November, Trump and his surrogates have amplified their claim that mail-in voting is susceptible to forgeries and fraud, even going so far as to suggest without evidence that children have "raid the mailboxes" to steal ballots.
"And they hand them to people that are signing the ballots down the end of the street," Trump said to reporters at the White House on Thursday. "They grab the ballots."
Despite the Trump administration's alarming characterization of voter and mail-in voting fraud, real-life cases have been scant. Election scholars have previously noted that a yearly average of seven cases and three convictions for each state have been documented for the last two decades, which equates to 0.00006% of all votes.
Loyola Law School professor Justin Levitt, who specializes in US elections, discovered only 31 cases of voter fraud between 2000-2014.
Additionally, Trump's baseless claims that mail-in voting primarily benefits Democrats and hurts a Republican candidate's prospects may not necessarily be true. Counties in California, Utah, and Washington reportedly did not experience a noticeable difference in political party preferences after they began conducting their elections through the mail.