Trump tweets that N.J. requires certification for VBM ballot, but Murphy says that’s ‘false’

President Donald Trump tweeted out criticism of New Jersey’s general election that will be conducted almost entirely through vote-by-mail ballots.

“In New Jersey they want you to certify that you asked for the Universal Mail-In Ballot that they sent you. But you never asked for it. Disaster in the wings,” the president tweeted.

Gov. Phil Murphy pushed back on Trump’s statement.

“False,” he said in his own tweet.

New Jersey law requires no such certification on mail-in ballots — just a valid signature.

Under Murphy’s executive order, all eligible voters – about 5.8 million – will automatically receive a vote-by-mail ballot.

All voters are free to cast paper ballots in-person at a polling location.  Murphy ordered each municipality in the state to have at last one polling place open on Election Day.

“When your Governor needs to fact check the President because the disinformation campaign from the RNC and White House is epic,” said Saily Avelenda, the executive director of the New Jersey Democratic State Committee, in a tweet.

Trump’s re-election campaign, along with the Republican National Committee and the New Jersey GOP, filed a lawsuit earlier this week in federal court challenging Murphy’s authority to cancel in-person voting.

Murphy this week accused the Trump campaign of seeking to “delegitimize” the upcoming election.

“This goes far beyond attempts at weaponizing the U.S. Postal Service to disenfranchise voters,” Murphy said regarding the lawsuit.  “This is now becoming a full-throated propaganda campaign to undermine the election itself.”

The lawsuit  alleged that Murphy’s “brazen power grab was not authorized by state law and violates both the Elections Clause and Electors Clause of the U.S. Constitution.”

“The NJGOP will not let him hijack our right to send his party a message this November, too,” said Republican State Chairman Doug Steinhardt. “We will always fight for free, fair and open elections where every person who is legally entitled to vote can do so.”