How Donald Trump could use Covid-19 coronavirus outbreak to sway US election – Martyn McLaughlin

Donald Trump may not be able to postpone November’s US presidential election, but he can weaponise Covid-19 to attack its legitimacy, writes Martyn McLaughlin.
President Donald Trump speaks about the coronavirus in the Rose Garden of the White House on Monday. Picture: Alex Brandon/APPresident Donald Trump speaks about the coronavirus in the Rose Garden of the White House on Monday. Picture: Alex Brandon/AP
President Donald Trump speaks about the coronavirus in the Rose Garden of the White House on Monday. Picture: Alex Brandon/AP

America is a country frayed by coronavirus, and yet its worn fabric risks being pulled apart even further come November’s presidential election.

With the US death toll now standing at north of 55,000, and the number of confirmed cases close to the grim landmark of one million, the prospect of an election that is seven months away may not seem like a priority.

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But given the prospect of a deadly second wave of the virus later this year, and the disconcerting fact that the incumbent in the White House has advocated injecting disinfectants by way of combating the virus – only to angrily accuse the media of misrepresenting what were explicitly dangerous and thoughtless remarks – the issue of the 59th quadrennial presidential election is of paramount importance.

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And not just in the US. Mr Trump’s increasingly bitter and acrimonious stance has led to him freezing funding for the World Health Organisation. The direction America takes this autumn will have a sizeable impact on the way the world at large continues to deal with a pandemic that may pose a deadly threat until 2022 and beyond.

Long-held fears that Mr Trump’s disdain for the democratic process may see him attempt to postpone the vote predate the pandemic, but the situation has seen the theory given renewed prominence by leading figures, including Joe Biden, the former Democratic vice-president vying to oust the 73-year-old from the White House.

Enshrined in law

Such accusations have been denied by Mr Trump as recently as Monday, when he described Mr Biden’s claims as “made-up propaganda”. His denials carry as much credibility as his promises, but either way, any such threats to push the election back – or worse besides – would be no more than bluster.

Unlike primaries in the US – which have been subjected to widespread disruption by Covid-19 – the presidential election is enshrined in legislation, and the duration of a president’s term is clearly laid out in the 20th amendment. More than that, the election is an integral part of America’s sense of itself. It can not and will not be thwarted.

That is not to say that Mr Trump and his supporters could not cause serious damage to the electoral process by casting public health safety doubts over the very act of voting. Only last month, he became the latest in a long line of Republicans to warn that making it easier for more people to vote would hurt his party politically.

In that respect, hard-hitting messaging about the dangers of going out to vote could well impact on turnout in November, and although the Trump administration cannot cancel, let alone delay the election, other factors at play could drastically impact on voting.

Emergency powers to cut voting locations

Richard Hasen, a law and political science professor at the University of California, has pointed out how levers exist – both at a federal and state level – to enforce emergency powers that would curb the number of voting locations.

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This is not simply idle speculation. The Wisconsin Democratic primary held earlier this month was beset by a lack of volunteer workers at polling stations and electoral supplies, which in turn had a detrimental impact on those seeking to cast their ballot. In Milwaukee, the state’s largest city, some 175 of 180 polling places were closed. Those that were open saw huge lines, with people waiting for several hours, all the while trying to observe social distancing measures.

It would be callous and reckless for such sweeping powers to be utilised in order to microtarget certain areas, but that does not mean it will not happen.

Perhaps mindful of being in it for the long haul, and exposed to the grim images from Wisconsin, there has been growing support for an alternative: namely, postal voting.

A poll commissioned by The Wall Street Journal and NBC showed last week that close to two-thirds of the US electorate are in favour of conducting November’s election entirely by mail.

Some states, including Colorado, Oregon, Utah, and Washington, already follow such a system, but rolling it out on a nationwide scale would be a logistical challenge, to say the least. And yet the danger is that not doing so could cast doubt on one of the most important US elections in the republic’s history.

Trump’s attacks on postal voting

It is not just logistics that stand in the way. Even as the pandemic has swept across the US, Mr Trump has railed against the use of postal votes, and sought to undermine their credibility. “Mail ballots are a very dangerous thing for this country because they're cheaters,” he said last month. “They go and collect them. They're fraudulent in many cases."

It is a familiar Republican battle cry. Predictably, there has been no evidence of widespread fraud taking place via what is known in the US as mail-in voting. The president, who personally used a postal ballot to vote in Florida’s Republican primary last month, even had his own voter-fraud investigatory committee look into the issue. It disbanded without producing evidence of any systemic issues.

The inconvenience of truth, however, is unlikely to convince Mr Trump to change course, and the danger of his attacks on the legitimacy of established voting processes ought to be clear and present, particularly as ordinary Americans, eager to have their say in how their country goes forward, seek to do so in the safest way possible,

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Covid-19, and will remain, the biggest story in US politics for the foreseeable future, but there is a depressing sub-plot running alongside it. Expect there to be several more twists and turns before it has run its course.

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