There has long been conflict in the United States over who gets to vote and how. In the years since Barack Obama’s election as president, those voting debates have become increasingly partisan, with Republican elected officials often pushing measures like requiring photo IDs that make it harder for people to vote, and Democratic officials advancing provisions like same-day registration that make it easier to vote.
“Trump aides exploring executive actions to curb voting by mail,” was the headline of an article in Politico last weekend (that was a news article, not an opinion piece). Politico’s reporting found that the White House was considering using executive actions to insert itself into the election process, which is usually run by states, including finding ways to make it harder for people to vote by mail.
1. Opposing changes to make it easier to vote amid COVID-19
2. Seeking to invalidate laws that make it easier to vote amid COVID-19
3. Advancing new practices and provisions that make it harder to vote
4. Anti-democratic rhetoric
5. Fundamental changes to the electoral process
The recent changes at the U.S. Postal Service that are slowing down mail delivery across the country are arguably the biggest threat to the American election system in 2020. If mail delivery continues to be slowed down, that creates two very important potential problems. First, in states where ballots must be received by officials before Election Day (33, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures), a slowed-down mail system could disenfranchise thousands and perhaps even millions of people. Secondly, a slower system creates the potential for a ton of ballots to arrive either just before, on or after Election Day, meaning that the counting of votes might stretch on for days or weeks and Americans wouldn’t know the winner of the presidential election for a long time. That’s not ideal in any circumstances, but particularly with a president like Trump who can’t be expected to wait for election results before trying to declare himself the winner.