Former President Donald Trump on Tuesday formally supported early, mail-in and absentee voting, reversing course from his previous criticism and questioning the legitimacy of these methods.
Non-traditional voting methods are included in the Swamp The Vote USA initiative and are promoted by Trump Force 47, a grassroots organizing program backed by the Republican National Committee.
“Republicans must win, and we will use every appropriate tool to defeat Democrats because they are destroying our country. We will protect your vote, whether you vote absentee, by mail, early or on Election Day. We will make sure your vote is safe and your voice is heard,” Trump said in a statement.
“We have to overwhelm the Radical Democrats with a ton of votes. The way we win is to overwhelm them. If we overwhelm them with votes, they can’t cheat. You have to make a plan, register, vote in any way you can. We have to get your vote,” the former president added.
According to a statement from the Trump campaign, Trump Force 47 will “use personal contact with voters to obtain new absentee ballots, vote-by-mail registrations and early in-person voting commitments.”
The 45th president was a vocal critic of mail-in voting throughout the 2020 election, calling the practice “totally corrupt” at a rally in Michigan as recently as February.
He changed course in April. Posted on Truth Social “Absentee voting, early voting and voting on Election Day are all good options. Republicans must make a plan, register and vote!”
Trump’s initial distrust of voting methods other than in-person voting was fueled by the last-minute victory of President Biden in key states in the 2020 election thanks to mail-in ballots.
In that election, Democrats who voted absentee or by mail outnumbered Republicans 58% to 32%. According to a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center:.
The shifting tide has been brewing for months, as Republicans began to embrace the voting method as part of their strategy to defeat Biden.
Donald Trump Jr. has supported early voting in December 2022, saying Republicans need to have the same “playbook” as Democrats to have any chance of winning in November.
“That’s what they’re good at. They figure out where they need to be, how they need to win. There’s no moral compass. There’s nothing. They figure out how to win, how to get where they need to be, and then they go do it. And they crush anything that gets in their way,” Trump’s son said at the time at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest conference.
Kellyanne Conway, a former senior adviser to President Trump, expressed a similar view in early May.
“So, I’m not a fan of early voting, but if this is the new normal, we adapt or die politically,” she said on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher.”
The use of non-traditional voting methods is consistent with Trump’s campaign messaging, which urged supporters to show up to the polls on Election Day to make the result “so big it can’t be rigged.”
