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I hate to do this to you, but you chose to be a dumb ass
Posted on: April 23, 2024 at 15:04:58 CT
Ace AU
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Republican officials privately say that whether Republican voters adapt to early in-person and mail voting could swing the 2024 election in closely contested states. But those efforts remain in tension with the fraud claims that animate Trump and the grass-roots MAGA movement.
Essentially, they are trying to persuade Trump voters to participate in voting methods that he falsely says are responsible for rampant fraud and cost him the White House four years ago.
“We hear it at the doors, some Republicans are still very reluctant now to drop their ballots in the mail,” said Jon Seaton, an Arizona Republican strategist who advised the state’s Republican senator John McCain. “President Trump clearly has a great deal of influence with Republican voters, so his support of mail-in voting will have a real impact on how many Republicans ultimately return their ballots by mail.”
In response to detailed questions for this article, a Trump spokesman referred The Washington Post to a video Trump taped for the RNC that praised early voting.
Republican strategists have privately warned Trump’s campaign that there are a number of states where having an aggressive early-voting and mail-in voting effort is imperative, including Georgia and Arizona. Georgia doesn’t have partisan voter registration, but more than 1.7 million people voted early in person and about 191,000 voted by mail out of 3.5 million ballots cast in the December 2022 Senate runoff. Early voting was concentrated in Democrat-rich metro Atlanta counties such as Fulton, DeKalb, Cobb and Gwinnett.
Cody Hall, a GOP strategist who is a senior adviser to Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R), said Trump’s rhetoric against mail-in ballots hurt him in the state in 2020, and “it’s totally possible it cost him the last election.” Hall said he also hasn’t seen signs yet of a dedicated GOP campaign to encourage early voting in Georgia this year.
“The messaging is one thing, but the resources are just as, if not more, important,” he said. “You have to actually do it. I’ve been screaming it from the mountaintop. You’ve got to have the money to execute this.”
A person close to Trump said the hope is that Trump will largely leave the topic alone publicly and not sabotage the efforts. Campaign and RNC officials are citing comments he has made at times encouraging Republicans to vote by mail as long as it is legal, saying the other side does it. “He’s never going to embrace voting by mail for the whole country,” according to this person, who like some others spoke on the condition of anonymity to reveal private discussions.
Trump adviser Susie Wiles has repeatedly told him that people vote by mail safely in Florida and that he won overwhelmingly, while also reminding him that he even voted by mail. In 2020, she was able to persuade Trump to tweet that voters in Florida should use mail because the state was safe, and Wiles has argued that the campaign should spend money and time promoting mail-in voting, people who have heard her arguments say.
“I think we can get him there,” the person close to Trump said, adding that the former president is relentlessly focused on winning, given the stakes for him financially and personally.
Former RNC chairwoman Ronna McDaniel emphasized the importance of encouraging early voting during her farewell speech at the RNC meeting in Houston earlier this month. “If Republicans succeed in getting Republicans to vote early and ballot harvest where legal, Donald Trump will win in November,” she said. “It really is that simple.”
Edited by Ace at 16:01:40 on 04/23/24
Essentially, they are trying to persuade Trump voters to participate in voting methods that he falsely says are responsible for rampant fraud and cost him the White House four years ago.
“We hear it at the doors, some Republicans are still very reluctant now to drop their ballots in the mail,” said Jon Seaton, an Arizona Republican strategist who advised the state’s Republican senator John McCain. “President Trump clearly has a great deal of influence with Republican voters, so his support of mail-in voting will have a real impact on how many Republicans ultimately return their ballots by mail.”
In response to detailed questions for this article, a Trump spokesman referred The Washington Post to a video Trump taped for the RNC that praised early voting.
Republican strategists have privately warned Trump’s campaign that there are a number of states where having an aggressive early-voting and mail-in voting effort is imperative, including Georgia and Arizona. Georgia doesn’t have partisan voter registration, but more than 1.7 million people voted early in person and about 191,000 voted by mail out of 3.5 million ballots cast in the December 2022 Senate runoff. Early voting was concentrated in Democrat-rich metro Atlanta counties such as Fulton, DeKalb, Cobb and Gwinnett.
Cody Hall, a GOP strategist who is a senior adviser to Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R), said Trump’s rhetoric against mail-in ballots hurt him in the state in 2020, and “it’s totally possible it cost him the last election.” Hall said he also hasn’t seen signs yet of a dedicated GOP campaign to encourage early voting in Georgia this year.
“The messaging is one thing, but the resources are just as, if not more, important,” he said. “You have to actually do it. I’ve been screaming it from the mountaintop. You’ve got to have the money to execute this.”
A person close to Trump said the hope is that Trump will largely leave the topic alone publicly and not sabotage the efforts. Campaign and RNC officials are citing comments he has made at times encouraging Republicans to vote by mail as long as it is legal, saying the other side does it. “He’s never going to embrace voting by mail for the whole country,” according to this person, who like some others spoke on the condition of anonymity to reveal private discussions.
Trump adviser Susie Wiles has repeatedly told him that people vote by mail safely in Florida and that he won overwhelmingly, while also reminding him that he even voted by mail. In 2020, she was able to persuade Trump to tweet that voters in Florida should use mail because the state was safe, and Wiles has argued that the campaign should spend money and time promoting mail-in voting, people who have heard her arguments say.
“I think we can get him there,” the person close to Trump said, adding that the former president is relentlessly focused on winning, given the stakes for him financially and personally.
Former RNC chairwoman Ronna McDaniel emphasized the importance of encouraging early voting during her farewell speech at the RNC meeting in Houston earlier this month. “If Republicans succeed in getting Republicans to vote early and ballot harvest where legal, Donald Trump will win in November,” she said. “It really is that simple.”
Edited by Ace at 16:01:40 on 04/23/24
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I hate to do this to you, but you chose to be a dumb ass - Ace AU - 4/23 15:04:58