The political right’s two-faced take on early voting and voting by mail

For many decades in the 20^th Century and early 21^st, voting by mail (i.e., “absentee voting”) in the U.S. was a mostly Republican phenomenon. That’s because it was a tool that was used chiefly by people who were wealthy enough to travel for extended periods – many of them seniors — who knew ahead of time when they’d be out of town on Election Day. And these kinds of voters tended to be more conservative and vote Republican.

In recent years, however, as purveyors of paranoid conspiracy theories have taken on a larger and larger role in the Republican Party and conservative movement generally, the right’s attitude toward voting by mail (and early in-person voting) has swung wildly back and forth.

Sometimes, non-Election Day voting is still promoted as a good thing.

Not that many years ago, North Carolina Republicans conducted a mass mailing in which they touted the ease and benefits of voting by mail. The GOP promotion was so ambitious and shared so widely, that even some deceased voters were sent promotional flyers. “Avoid the lines on Election Day,” the front of the flyer urged. “It’s easy!” read the flipside.

And, indeed, even now in some circumstances, Republicans – most notably, vice presidential nominee JD Vance — continue, when it suits their needs, to urge participation in early voting.

Unfortunately, not everyone on the political right is on board with such a commonsense view of early voting all of the time – most notably, Donald Trump.

Over the years, Trump has repeatedly stated that early voting is a hoax and “ridiculous,” and a nefarious scheme employed by Democrats to commit massive voter fraud. Never mind that Trump fared well in early voting and voting by mail in many states (like North Carolina) in 2016 and 2020 or that research indicates that widespread voter fraud is essentially non-existent. To Trump and many conservatives who hang on his every word, early voting and voting by mail are both part of a grand and diabolical conspiracy devised to harm him.

When I asked former Republican Illinois Congressman Joe Walsh to explain this two-faced approach to the issue during a press briefing sponsored by the Harris-Walz campaign yesterday, he did not hesitate.

It is, he said, a byproduct of Trump’s “Bible” about the 2020 election to which all Republicans are required to adhere if they wish to stay in his favor – namely, the lie that the election was somehow stolen. Those who stray from this narrative, Walsh observed, are quickly persona non grata with the Trump machine.

Of course, the downside for the GOP of Trump’s dishonest stance on non-Election Day voting, Walsh noted, is that it’s bumping up against the reality that Trump and other Republicans will be harmed in the current election if their supporters don’t take advantage of it. Hence the hypocritical stance of politicians like Vance who urge early voting participation even as they parrot Trump’s lie about 2020.

Notwithstanding the problems presented by this contradiction, the persistence of 2020 lie does help to boost two other key Trump strategies: voter suppression and promoting distrust in the election outcome.

As has been reported widely, Republicans have filed an avalanche of lawsuits across the country designed to purge voters from the rolls and make voting more difficult for those whom they perceive are likely to vote Democratic. A federal judge will hear arguments on motions in one such case this morning in Wilmington that would purge nearly a quarter-million North Carolina voters.

Meanwhile, the constant drumbeat of lies helps sow the ground for the resistance, unrest, and even violence that Trump has already telegraphed he will pursue and help foment if he loses next month.

The bottom line: Bipartisan experts have testified repeatedly that U.S. elections are overwhelmingly honest and that voting by mail and early in-person voting are important components of the system that should be expanded, not restricted. To his credit, that’s a take that was endorsed this week by North Carolina’s former Republican governor Pat McCrory.

In the days ahead, it’s incumbent on all people of good will to repeatedly speak and share these truths.