WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Thursday questioned whether the 2020 presidential election should potentially be postponed, claiming it could be ripe for fraud.
“With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history,” Trump tweeted. “It will be a great embarrassment to the USA. Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???”
Earlier in the morning, Trump tweeted that mail-in voting is “already proving to be a catastrophic disaster.”
“Even testing areas are way off. The Dems talk of foreign influence in voting, but they know that Mail-In Voting is an easy way for foreign countries to enter the race. Even beyond that, there’s no accurate count!” he tweeted.
Critics have voiced concern that Trump will press for the 2020 election to be delayed amid the coronavirus pandemic. At a House Judiciary Committee hearing Tuesday, Attorney General Bill Barr was asked if a sitting president can change the date of the election.
“I haven’t looked into that question, under the Constitution,” Barr said.
While states have the authority to delay their primary elections, only Congress can change the date for the general election for president, because the Constitution gives Congress the authority to set the general election date.
Since 1845, Congress has required the appointment of presidential electors (now by election in every state) to take place on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November, which this year is November 3.
