Trump announces he is embracing ballot harvesting
“Our path forward is to MASTER the Democrats’ own game”
Former President Donald Trump's campaign is examining ways to win over the mail-in vote after the Democrats' performance in the 2020 presidential and 2022 midterm elections. The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump's staff is examining state laws on absentee and mail-in voting, as well as ballot harvesting techniques.
Trump, who was famously critical of mail-in votes following the 2020 election, is changing his tune following comments by some GOP 2024 presidential hopefuls, like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who have criticized the party for not capitalizing on opportunities in recent elections by focusing too much on Election Day turnout.
The change of heart can be observed in a Trump fundraising email released earlier this week which read, "The radical Democrats have used ballot harvesting to cancel out YOUR vote and walk away with elections that they NEVER should have won. But I’m doing something HUGE to fight back.”
He continued: “Our path forward is to MASTER the Democrats’ own game of harvesting ballots in every state we can. But that also means we need to start laying the foundation for victory RIGHT NOW.”
Trump told Breitbart News in December that the GOP has to "live with the system that stinks" but maintained that "a mail-in ballot will always be corrupt," and that Republicans need to look for ways to make elections more secure.
Other Republicans have noted that the GOP simply needs to use whatever tools available to win over voters and that the Republican National Committee is looking into the issue following the midterms last November.
Roughly 60 percent of Democrats voted by mail in 2020 compared to 30 percent of Republicans.
“We simply have to beat them at this,” said Arizona GOP candidate Blake Masters who lost in a close race this past November.