Democrats fight back in US Postal Service showdown with Trump

“The Postmaster Basic and prime Postal Service management should reply to the Congress and the American individuals as to why they’re pushing these harmful new insurance policies that threaten to silence the voices of tens of millions, simply months earlier than the election,” Democratic leaders, together with Pelosi and Senate Minority Chief Chuck Schumer, mentioned in a press release saying the listening to they wish to have subsequent week with DeJoy, a prime Trump fundraiser.

The swift Democratic mobilization places the raging dispute over the sanctity of November’s vote on the heart of the election marketing campaign and escalates tensions that would spill into a protracted political and authorized imbroglio if November’s result’s tight.

As a matter of technique, highlighting Trump’s remark final week that he opposed $25 billion in new funding for the mail system as a result of it will result in extra mail-in voting might also enhance Democratic efforts to persuade voters to forged their ballots early and doubtlessly financial institution a lead for the social gathering nominee Joe Biden.

Thousands and thousands of additional voters are anticipated to forged their vote by mail this yr, given their wariness about displaying up at polling locations with the virus nonetheless raging. Trump has responded to the prospect with false claims that mail-in voting is rife with fraud and can result in essentially the most corrupt election in historical past.

Trump’s prospects have been harmed by his erratic dealing with of the coronavirus — which helped to plunge the US financial system, which he had hoped to journey to reelection, into freefall.

“I hope to win, how will you not while you see numbers like this each on the virus and on the financial system?” the President mentioned Saturday at a information convention at his New Jersey golf resort.

The USA has extra Covid-19 instances and extra deaths than another nation. Whereas some international locations that did a much better job than the US of suppressing the virus are preventing a resurgence, the dimensions of the US tragedy stays staggering. For 16 out of the 20 days main as much as Saturday, the US reported greater than 1,000 new deaths per day, in line with Johns Hopkins College and the Covid Monitoring Challenge.

USPS, White Home pledge no extra removing of sorting machines

Regardless of Trump’s damaging claims, there was one signal that the administration was starting to appreciate the President’s expenses about fraud and considerations concerning the sanctity of the USPS might rebound on him.

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, the runner-up to Biden in the Democratic major race, warned on “State of the Union” that greater than the integrity of the Postal Service was at stake.

“What’s most necessary, whether or not you are a Democrat, whether or not a Republican, whether or not you are a progressive, whether or not you are a conservative, do you imagine in American democracy?” Sanders requested.

“Do you imagine that, in the midst of a pandemic, when we now have misplaced 170,000 individuals already, individuals have gotten to place their lives on the road to enter a voting station, or can they vote in by way of a mail-in poll?”

Meadows, nevertheless, signaled on the identical present that the White Home is not going to let up on its warnings of huge pending electoral fraud — and an try to attract a false distinction between “absentee balloting” and “mail-in voting” regardless of rigorous techniques in place to make sure the authenticity of all votes.

Informed by Tapper that there isn’t any proof of fraud in mail-in voting in common elections in the US, Meadows replied: “There is not any proof that there is not both.”

Trump: ‘There’s fraud, there’s theft’

Moreover attempting to skew the election forward of time by limiting mail-in balloting, Trump might also be renewing his baseless claims as a result of he is waiting for after the election.

He warned on Saturday that mail-in ballots might delay the results of the election for “months or for years.”

“These ballots are all going to be misplaced. They’ll be gone … the ballots are misplaced. There’s fraud. There’s theft. It is occurring in all places.”

Election specialists say election fraud is tiny in comparison with the dimensions of the US citizens and that there isn’t any proof that mail-in voting techniques already in place in a number of states are any extra susceptible to irregularities.

Trump seems to be both providing himself a face-saving manner out if he loses massive to Biden or to be laying the political groundwork for a number of authorized challenges in a determined bid to hold on to energy if he loses narrowly.

He’s enjoying with hearth since his claims danger severely damaging the prospects that the election will likely be seen as free and truthful by all voters. Such a nationwide consensus kinds the bedrock of the American political system itself.