President Donald Trump generated backlash on Twitter Thursday morning when he floated the idea of postponing the 2020 United States election.
The incendiary tweet was the latest development in Trump's months-long campaign to discredit voting by mail ahead of an election that's expected to see stratospheric levels of absentee voting in the face of the pandemic.
With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history. It will be a great embarrassment to the USA. Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 30, 2020
The tweet was alarming not just because the President has no constitutional power to decide the election date, but because delaying the election has never been done, even in the hardest times faced by the United States. Not during the Civil War. Not during the Great Depression. Not during the World Wars.
On Friday, the government of Hong Kong announced that it would postpone its September elections due to the virus.
President Donald Trump's latest White House Press Secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, strongly condemned that:
Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany: "We condemn the Hong Kong government's decision to postpone [its election] for one year." https://t.co/dt8NZGj5kP pic.twitter.com/nuMsBpGZ2N
— The Hill (@thehill) July 31, 2020
McEnany said:
"We condemn the Hong Kong government's decision to postpone for one year its legislative council elections and to disqualify opposition candidates. This action undermines the democratic processes and freedoms that have underpinned Hong Kong's prosperity, and this is only the most recent in a growing list of broken promises by Beijing, which promised autonomy and freedom to the Hong Kong people until 2047 in the Sino-British joint declaration."
The day after her boss floated postponing the election in the face of the virus, McEnany decried China for postponing its election in the face of the virus, claiming that it undermined "democratic processes and freedoms."
People thought that was quite rich.
Good grief, you couldn't make it up.
— William Earley (@wmedub) July 31, 2020
I love the consistency of this administration.
— Robert Ekendahl (@rekendahl) July 31, 2020
“But we totally support Trump for suggesting the same" is what she went on to say.
— Vincent Atl (@VincentAtl1) July 31, 2020
RIP Irony.
— allenglenn (@allenglenn64) July 31, 2020
pic.twitter.com/gMqO3x0Ftq
— UtahUte85 (@bryanth2o) July 31, 2020
She is so bad at this.
— DG (@DaveLG) July 31, 2020
And people were excited to see the return of McEnany's "binder of lies."
Trump's calls to postpone the election have rattled Americans across the country who fear he'll only continue to sow mistrust in the electoral process.
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