Yahoo News Joe Biden Backs Mail-In Voting While Trump Questions Election Security
By now, we know that President Donald Trump has made an enemy out of the United States Postal Service, mail-in ballots, and the voters who plan to access them. But what of his opponent, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden?
As the country grapples with a resurgence of COVID-19 spikes, voters are turning to mail-in ballots in record numbers as a means to stay safe while casting their votes for this year's election. Still, voting by mail has become an intense bipartisan issue. With Republicans in Congress backing the president's rhetoric against the voting method—namely that mail-in ballots make way for widespread election fraud, despite little evidence to back up their claims—Trump and Biden are set to discuss its election integrity during their first presidential debate tonight.
Trump's growing animosity has some worrying that he's laying down the infrastructure to claim a victory in November—mail-in ballots be damned. "The most benign explanation for Mr. Trump's obsessive focus on mail-in balloting is that he is looking for an excuse for a possible loss to his Democratic opponent, Joe Biden, in November," wrote Rick Hasen, a professor at the University of California, Irvine and the author of Election Meltdown, for The New York Times. "The less benign explanation is that he is seeking to sow chaos to drive down turnout and undermine the legitimacy of the election, laying the groundwork for contesting a close election if he loses."
Despite Trump's blatant opposition to mail-in ballots, Biden has taken up its mantle. Below, we track Biden's stance on mail-in voting and election security.
Biden has explicitly backed vote-by-mail efforts and blasted Trump for opposing funds to the USPS.
During an online fundraiser in April, the former vice president called on Congress to provide enough funding to states in order to allow voters to vote by mail in the November general election.
"We have to make it easier for everybody to be able to vote, particularly if we are still basically in the kind of lockdown circumstances we are in now," he said, as reported by The Associated Press. "But that takes a lot of money, and it's going to require us to provide money for states and insist they provide mail-in ballots."
During that same fundraiser, Biden criticized the Trump administration's efforts to deny funding to the struggling Postal Service in the $2 trillion coronavirus relief package.
"He's already trying to undermine the election with false claims of voter fraud and threatening to block essential COVID assistance if any extra funds go to the U.S. Postal Service," Biden said. "What in God's name was that about other than trying to let the word out that he's going to do all that he can to make it very hard for people to vote."
It's worth nothing that during Florida's primary, the president voted by mail.
The Biden campaign is spending a lot of money to fight against mail-in voting disinformation.
Robert Bauer, a senior adviser on the Biden campaign, told Greg Sargent of The Washington Post that the campaign plans to spend big to fight back against vote-by-mail disinformation—particularly, that espoused by Trump and his administrators. The campaign wants people to initiate their vote-by-mail process as soon as possible and to assure voters that this method is secure.
"We are investing heavily in making sure voters understand what he is trying to do and are not deterred by falsehoods," Bauer told the Post, adding that they are also “urging voters to obtain and cast their ballots early, early, early."
The Biden team is also backing current litigation in some swing states against laws that are voiding ballots postmarked before Election Day but arriving after.
What about foreign interference?
Much has been said about possible foreign interference in the U.S. presidential election, especially after Russian meddling was reported in the 2016 presidential election, which ultimately saw the defeat of Hillary Clinton.
On multiple occasions, the president has deflected or downplayed Russian interference in the 2016 election. Last year, he also told ABC that he wouldn't turn away information on a political opponent if it came from a foreign country. "I think you might want to listen, there isn't anything wrong with listening," Trump said. "If somebody called from a country, Norway, [and said] ‘we have information on your opponent'—oh, I think I'd want to hear it."
In a statement, per ABC, Biden said he would stay vigilant against foreign interference in electoral results if he became president. "If elected president, I will treat foreign interference in our election as an adversarial act that significantly affects the relationship between the United States and the interfering nation's government," he wrote.
Still, when Biden was in the White House serving as President Barack Obama's vice president, the Obama administration was criticized for its slow response to Russia's alleged hacking of political institutions. A bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee said in 2018 that the White House didn't do enough to shield or stop Russian interference in the 2016 election. The Obama administration's delayed response was called "flat-footed," despite "the red flashing signals [that] were all there."
Biden supporters are much more likely to vote by mail in this election.
According to a survey by Democracy Fund + UCLA Nationscape, 48 percent of voters backing Biden said that they will vote by mail. That's more than double the 23 percent of voters who are opting for mail-in ballots and also backing Trump.
The disparity may spell danger for the Biden camp if Trump refuses to recognize mail-in ballot results. During a September press conference, the president refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power if Biden won. "We're going to have to see what happens. You know that. I've been complaining very strongly about the ballots. And the ballots are a disaster," he said, as reported by NPR. "Get rid of the ballots and you'll have a very peaceful—there won't be a transfer, frankly, there'll be a continuation. The ballots are out of control. You know it. And you know who knows it better than anybody else? The Democrats know it better than anybody else."
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