Trump’s Attack on Mail Voting Is Good for Democrats

Patrick Fallon/ZUMA

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This is so bugfuck nuts:

President Trump’s unfounded attacks on mail balloting are discouraging his own supporters from embracing the practice, according to polls and Republican leaders across the country, prompting growing alarm that one of the central strategies of his campaign is threatening GOP prospects in November.

Voting by mail has always been viewed as favorable to Republicans—or at worst a wash. Democrats embraced it this year because it makes sense in the middle of a pandemic, but Donald Trump simply refused to believe that anybody, let alone Democrats, could possibly be acting altruistically. The only thing that made sense to him was that mail voting must be some kind of Democratic trick and therefore he was opposed to it.

That’s what happens when you’re so transactional and so cynical that you don’t believe non-selfish behavior is even possible. This should have been a no-brainer bipartisan initiative, but Trump didn’t believe it and no one in the Republican Party had the guts to tell him the truth. Now they’re getting exactly what they deserve.

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PLEASE—BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things it doesn’t like—which is most things that are true.

We’ll say it loud and clear: At Mother Jones, no one gets to tell us what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please do your part and help us reach our $150,000 membership goal by May 31.

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