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President Trump has told confidants he'll declare victory on Tuesday night if it looks like he's "ahead," reports Axios citing three sources familiar with his private comments.
According to the report there’s a very real possibility that he will step up to a podium and announce victory late that night — with tens of millions of votes still to be counted.
This is a scenario that Trump’s opponents have suspected for months, and one actively being considered within the Trump circle for weeks.
At about midnight on November 3, Trump and his inner circle believe he will appear to lead in key states that open his path to the White House. In-person votes cast during the day would have been mostly counted, showing him ahead.
His claim, not for the first time, would be misleading to say the least.
Ninety-three million, or about two-thirds of the votes counted in the 2016 elections have already been cast in 2020. Mail-in ballots account for 60 million of these votes, with another 30 odd million ballots expected through the post.
Many states do not start counting mail-ins before election day, so there is no way of knowing what’s in the envelopes, and the numbers are unprecedented so this could take long—days, perhaps weeks.
Several states, including Pennsylvania and Wisconsin that are crucial for a Trump victory, will count ballots received by post several days after the election, so long as the ballots are postmarked November 3 or earlier.
Once Trump announces victory, the campaign will claim that the mail-ins are fraudulent, promoting the narrative of a rigged election through television and social media, and go to court to have the votes rejected in an environment of confusion.
The playbook has been written already. In Texas’s densely populated, heavily democratic Harris County, 1,27,000 votes were cast by drive-through voting. The id requirements for this innovative method are exactly the same as in-person voting in booths, but Republicans have now gone to court arguing drive-through voting is unconstitutional. It doesn’t matter that it was a Republican administration that put the system in place so that people could vote in safety during the pandemic.
So why all the fuss so late in the day? The answer is in the numbers.
According to Professor Michael McDonald of the University of Florida, who has tracked the numbers, registered democrats have outvoted registered republicans 2:1 in early voting. Also, a huge number of early voters haven’t stated their party affiliation, but have historically leant democratic.
The record-breaking early voter turnout may leave Republicans too much ground to make up on election day.
‘Legal’ voter suppression is one way to limit the damage.
The Harris County case will be heard just a day before the election by a conservative federal judge. His ruling may result in the disenfranchisement of 1,27,000, mostly democratic, voters.
There are far bigger prizes at stake. The state of Florida, for instance. It’s a state that is a must-win for Trump — if he loses Florida, he loses the election. But it may not be the voter who decides. It may well be the courts, because the margin is likely to be small whichever way it goes. Florida doesn’t give up its 29 electoral votes very easily.
This has happened before. The US Supreme Court decided in George HW Bush’s favour in 2000, stopping a recount that may have changed not just American history, but geopolitics.
One of the men who helped Bush mount his case in 2000 is Brett Kavanaugh, now Supreme Court justice. One of three appointed by Trump creating a clear 6-3 conservative majority.
Trump has as good as announced that he expects the support of the Supreme Court. It is with scenarios like Florida in mind that the latest Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett was sworn in place of the late Ruth Bader Ginsberg, last month. The liberal icon’s coffin had barely been lowered as Barrett took oath as a grinning Trump looked on.
Trump needs Florida, whichever way he gets it. His support among a reliable demographic -- senior citizens -- has waned. His 7-point 2016 advantage with this reliable group of voters in a state that retirees love is almost wiped out.
They gave his crudeness and blatant misbehaviour a pass in 2016, not any more. They blame him squarely for his mishandling of the pandemic, specifically for putting those like them, who are the most vulnerable, at risk. Almost all of them know someone who has died because of Covid.
And while Trump and his enablers may continue to peddle the lie that the President has “ended the pandemic” (A White House release said that, seriously), what Trump fears is that the pandemic will end his presidency.
