Hindsight is, famously, 20/20. Across the nation, millions of voters are realizing that voting for Donald Trump was the equivalent of jumping out of an aircraft without a parachute. We’ve seen those who rely on Medicaid shocked as they realize their coverage is over, rural communities seeing their local hospitals close, and a submerged town having its flood protection funding yanked away.
Yesterday, Trump dropped the bombshell that he plans to outlaw mail-in ballots, apparently seeing them as an easy route to a “rigged election”. This bright idea came straight from the mouth of the world-famous democracy fan Vladimir Putin, currently serving his fifth term as President of Russia.
Trump says Putin told him,”Your election was rigged because you have mail-in voting. … It’s impossible to have mail-in voting and have honest elections.” Nodding along like an idiot, Trump agreed, leaving the talk to promptly detonate a bomb under American democracy. I mean, at this point, is it even fair to call this “manipulation”? Trump is just taking orders!
Mail-in ballots are used in almost every major democracy in the world and are essentially the only way for many to vote. Those who rely on them include the elderly, military personnel, students away at college, or those with disabilities that physically prevent them from attending the polls.
Now, one Trump voter, Mesa, Arizona resident Aaron Ingebrigtsen, is having to come to terms that his 2024 vote may be his last:
“I am disabled and suffering every single day. I am stuck at home and bedridden much of the time. As I write this I am once again filling up my bed pan like every other day. I have used Mail in Ballots for Decades. I voted for Trump with one. But Trump wants to take away my rights?! And people actually agree with him?!!”
It’s easy (usually also fun) to mock Trump voters for the misery they’ve inflicted on themselves, but Ingebrigtsen actually seems like a decent person. In a comment to his post, he underlines, “I regret voting for Trump”, and a glance through his feed indicates that while he may once have been a Trump fan, he’s since developed empathy and intelligence, now spending his time weaving mats for homeless people.
Leopards! Faces! You know the drill
Even so, once again, this is a textbook case of “what did you think was going to happen?” In both of his presidential runs, Trump was open and forthright about all the horrible things he was planning to do to various groups of people, so if you’re in a vulnerable position, you shouldn’t be surprised he’s now coming for you.
Even so, we can only hope that this mail-in ballot ban is just another of those half-formed brainfarts Trump has from time to time, like that one time he said he was going to tariff Hollywood movies and then promptly forgot all about it when something shinier came along to distract him.
We suspect Trump (and nervous Republican strategists) will eventually conclude that disenfranchising millions of elderly shut-in voters hooked on 24/7 Fox News isn’t the best route to electoral triumph.
