Mail-in ballot puts Donald Trump against Ron DeSantis and other Republican leaders

“If we don’t bank our ballots early, we’re going to keep losing,” Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway told Fox News on Tuesday night. “But we didn’t do it in 2020 because everyone said, ‘Don’t vote early because it’s corrupt,'” countered host Laura Ingraham.

Percentage of U.S. voters who are confident their absentee or mail-in ballots were counted as they intended

Trump has been an outspoken critic of mail-in ballots, both before and after the 2020 loss. He has circulated conspiracy theories claiming mail-in ballot fraud, but voting experts say it is rare. and party strategists say early voting has led to election losses, including in gubernatorial and Senate races in Arizona and Pennsylvania.

“Remember, mail-in ballots will never give you a fair and free election. Never, never, never. Never, never!!!” Posted on social media shortly after.

Charles Stewart III, a professor of political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and co-director of the voting technology project at Caltech and MIT, said Republican distaste for mail-in voting “has become a grassroots badge of honor. ‘ said. According to him, in 2020, his 60% of Democrats voted by mail nationwide, while Republican participation was his 30%. In 2016, the parties were pretty evenly matched, he said.

Stewart said there was ballot robbery (the practice of political operatives collecting and dropping absentee ballots from people) and mail-in ballot fraud, Stewart said. He added, “It would take Ron DeSantis or someone with a strong voice to articulate how important it is to win an election.”

In Georgia, Walker won the election day ballot by 14 points over Democrat Rafael Warnock. But Warnock came out on top in a hotly contested race, beating his rivals by 17 points in mail-in and early voting, according to state data.

In Pennsylvania, where some Republicans attacked mail-in ballots, Democrat John Fetterman also lost election-day votes to Republican Mehmet Oz in the Senate election, though Oz had about 960,000 to 234,000. I cast a postal ballot to secure my victory.

Beyond convenience, mail-in and early voting in many states gives voters more days to cast their ballots. A variety of obstacles, including bad weather, car trouble, and work obligations, can keep voters away from voting until Election Day when they leave their polling place.

Senator Roger Marshall (Republic, Kansas) said:

The Republican National Committee will begin reviewing midterm election results, with a partial focus on ways to encourage early voting, officials said.

In some areas, such as Florida, Republicans are trying to sidestep the former president’s rhetoric.In 2020, state Republicans falsified Trump’s tweets to remove negative references to mail-in ballots. On the other hand, his call for absentee ballots was left intact, but it made no real difference.

“Florida has had early voting and absentee ballots for so long that we know how to do it,” said Florida Senator Rick Scott, chair of the Senate Republican campaign division. said. “But in states that haven’t, I think Republicans need to improve how we make sure we get votes that way.”

DeSantis, who is seen as the biggest threat to Trump’s candidacy in the 2024 presidential race, won a second term by nearly 20 points last month and repeatedly urged voters to vote early. “If you wait until Election Day, you’ll get a flat tire and you can’t mulligan,” he said at a rally in October.

A Trump spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment. Some Republicans support his call for tougher election laws. Sen. Rand Paul (R. Kentucky) said: “It’s the best way to make sure you’re who you say you are.”

Josh Holmes, a Republican strategist and former chief of staff to Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, warned that just adopting Democrat tactics won’t be easy. Democratic votes are concentrated in urban areas, but the Republican coalition is spread across rural and suburban areas, making it less efficient for Republicans to collect ballots, he said.

“The manpower needed is far more than the Democrats have to do,” Holmes said. “It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it.”

He added that the party has a lot of work to do to overcome the damage done in 2020 by Trump’s smearing mail-in ballots.

He said there has been a huge effort over the past two years to get Republican voters back into early voting and legal mail-in ballots. However, “there is still strong resistance among certain segments of the base,” he said.

Georgia Republican Gov. Brian Kemp won reelection last month against Democrat Stacey Abrams, invested heavily in outreach efforts and used data to identify people likely to vote before election day. and sent volunteers and paid voters home.

Mark Stephenson, Data Advisor at Kemp, said: “Without candidates who agree to early voting and tell the base they need to go to the elections, we could be spending millions of dollars on voter turnout with little effect.”

— Katie Steck Ferek Contributed to this article.