In a tweet this morning, President Donald Trump floated the idea of postponing the 2020 election until the coronavirus pandemic is over or until election officials can fully develop secure election procedures.
“With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most inaccurate and fraudulent in history. It will be a great embarrassment to the USA,” Trump said on Twitter. “Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???
Former acting U.S. Solicitor General Neal Katyal, a Harvard law professor, said that the courts would never allow Trump to move the election date.
“It’s silly. Constitution (Art 2) gives this power to Congress. (Congress) exercised it,” Katyal said. “He can’t delay election (without the Congress) and he lost (the) House in 2018.”
On social media, Several top Democrats quickly pounced on the idea.
“This is so dangerous,” said U.S. Senator Michael Bennet (D-Colorado). “Americans and elected officials at every level – from every party – must reject this unprecedented threat to our democracy and stand up for the integrity of our elections.”
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler said that Trump “does not have the ability to delay the election.”
“Our elections are enshrined in the Constitution,” he said. “The Constitution also says that if the date of the election is to be changed, it must be changed by Congress.
CNN Capitol Hill reporter Ali Zaslav reported that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell “was silent when asked multiple times whether it’s acceptable to him that President Donald Trump suggested delaying the presidential election.”
This is not an idea anyone, especially POTUS, should float. Our democracy is based on elections in which everyone knows the rules and they apply to all,” former George W. Bush White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said on Twitter. “Election Day is and will be Nov 3, 2020. Mr. President – please don’t even pretend to mess with this. It’s a harmful idea.”
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November 6, 2018