Hillary Clinton: In 2020 We Should ‘Make Voting by Mail the Norm’

Hillary Clinton, former Dem Party presidential nominee, called on Congress to ‘make mail voting the norm’ along with “free postage” as a consequence of public health concerns because of the coronavirus outbreak.

Trump stated earlier this week that he thinks the present national emergency will last through July or even August. According to The White House, they haven’t yet stated what, if any, preparations may be necessary for the election in November.

Hillary’s call echoed a likewise demand by Katie Hobbs, Arizona Secretary of State, who asked legislators to permit all-mail voting in 2020. Repubs are skeptical, and recalled the words of Rahm Emanuel, President-elect Obama’s incoming chief of staff, in 2008: ‘You never really want a severe crisis to go to waste.’

Multiple states already permit voting by mail, although Repubs warned that California’s system is prone to fraud. There, Dems legalized a system referred to as “ballot harvesting,” allowing unverified 3rd parties to deliver one another’s ballots — effectively permitting party organizers to bring multitudes of ballots to be counted.

Repubs blamed some of the 2018 losses in CA on “ballot harvesting.” Plus, Repub efforts to copy Dems’ tactics failed because Repubs generally are more reluctant to give their ballots to other people.

Hillary is familiar with voting by mail’s value: Clinton was thought to be running neck-and-neck with Senator Sanders in CA in the 2016 presidential primary, yet then Clinton won by several points — mainly because she experienced stronger turnout with mail-in ballots. Mail-in ballots additionally helped Clinton run popular vote margins up in 2016.