Trump Has No Power to Tell States How to Conduct Elections

As is reliably the case with President Trump, one can agree with his policy preferences while recoiling at his disregard for the constitutional processes and principles attendant to making such policy. I happen to agree with him that we would be better off without mail-in voting (and related innovations, such as ballot harvesting and drop boxes). But Trump’s notion that he can direct such an outcome, or that the state legislatures should care what he thinks, is not just ill-conceived but alarming coming from a president who has already once abused his powers to try to retain the office.

If I had my druthers, we’d return to a default requirement that people vote in-person, at the appropriate polling precinct, on the same day. I’m not against all innovation: We now have a national population of over 330 million, and well over 150 million Americans voted in the last national election; if that’s too many to get it done on a single day, I’d be fine with having a two- or three-day in-person voting period. And note that I said a default in-person voting mandate. The traditional availability of absentee voting for extraordinary excuses should be continued — e.g., people who can’t get to the ballot box because of serious medical issues, or because important business takes them out of town (or out of the country, as it did to me in 2000 in connection with a terrorism investigation). These extraordinary excuses, however, should be carefully policed: Since our presumption would be in-person submission of ballots on Election Day(s), those relative few voters given the privilege to submit absentee ballots would have to follow the regulations to the letter to have their votes counted (i.e., they should not be heard to complain that any lack of compliance — e.g., an error in the address or failure to date the ballot — is immaterial).

About the Author

Andrew C. McCarthy

Andrew C. McCarthy is a senior fellow at National Review Institute, an NR contributing editor, and author of Ball of Collusion: The Plot to Rig an Election and Destroy a Presidency.

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As is reliably the case with President Trump, one can agree with his policy preferences while recoiling at his disregard for the constitutional processes and principles attendant to making such policy. I happen to agree with him that we would be better off without mail-in voting (and related innovations, such as ballot harvesting and drop boxes). But Trump’s notion that he can direct such an outcome, or that the state legislatures should care what he thinks, is not just ill-conceived but alarming coming from a president who has already once abused his powers to try to retain the office.

If I had my druthers, we’d return to a default requirement that people vote in-person, at the appropriate polling precinct, on the same day. I’m not against all innovation: We now have a national population of over 330 million, and well over 150 million Americans voted in the last national election; if that’s too many to get it done on a single day, I’d be fine with having a two- or three-day in-person voting period. And note that I said a default in-person voting mandate. The traditional availability of absentee voting for extraordinary excuses should be continued — e.g., people who can’t get to the ballot box because of serious medical issues, or because important business takes them out of town (or out of the country, as it did to me in 2000 in connection with a terrorism investigation). These extraordinary excuses, however, should be carefully policed: Since our presumption would be in-person submission of ballots on Election Day(s), those relative few voters given the privilege to submit absentee ballots would have to follow the regulations to the letter to have their votes counted (i.e., they should not be heard to complain that any lack of compliance — e.g., an error in the address or failure to date the ballot — is immaterial).

About the Author

Andrew C. McCarthy

Andrew C. McCarthy is a senior fellow at National Review Institute, an NR contributing editor, and author of Ball of Collusion: The Plot to Rig an Election and Destroy a Presidency.