Iowa Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst said they disagree with President Donald Trump, who on Thursday floated the idea of delaying the November election.\u2026<\/b>
\nIowa Republican Sens. Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst said they disagree with President Donald Trump, who on Thursday floated the idea of delaying the November election.
\u201cWe\u2019re a country based on the rule of law, so nobody\u2019s going to change anything until we change the law,\u201d Grassley said. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter what one individual in this country says. We are still a country based on the rule of law and we want to follow the law until either the Constitution is changed or until the law\u2019s changed.\u201d
Brendan Conley, a spokesperson for Ernst, said in an email that the senator would not support postponing the election.
\u00ab\u00a0She has said previously that she supports allowing people to vote by mail as long as they have requested the ballots,\u00a0\u00bb he said. \u00ab\u00a0As the former Montgomery County auditor, she believes that with every election we must ensure we are protecting transparency and integrity.\u00a0\u00bb
Ernst is seeking a second term in November.
The date of the presidential election is set by federal law, and the president does not have the power to change it. Congress could act, but doing so would be unprecedented, according to experts. The United States did not delay presidential elections during the Civil War or World War II.
However, others are far more concerned that the president’s rhetoric around mail-in voting will undermine the nation’s election and sow distrust in its outcome.
\u00ab\u00a0With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history,\u00a0\u00bb Trump tweeted without evidence Thursday morning. \u00ab\u00a0It will be a great embarrassment to the USA. Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???\u00a0\u00bb
Trump currently trails Democratic rival and former Vice President Joe Biden in polls of a number of key battleground states. In Iowa, a June Des Moines Register\/Mediacom Iowa Poll showed Trump leading by just one percentage point, which is within the poll’s margin of error of plus or minus 3.8 percentage points. He carried the state by nine percentage points in 2016.
Like in many states across the country, mail-in and absentee votes surged in Iowa’s primary elections this year as Iowans seek ways to avoid crowds in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic. According to numbers from the Iowa Secretary of State’s office, nearly 80% of Iowa’s primary voters cast an absentee ballot, helping to set record-breaking turnout.
Republican Secretary of State Paul Pate has received approval from the Republican-led state Legislature to again send absentee ballot request forms to every registered voter in the state.
However, a new state law passed this year has riled voting rights activists. That law prevents county auditors from using the state’s voter registration database to fill in any missing information on the form, such as a driver’s license or voter PIN. Instead, they must contact the voter for that information directly.
Pate plans to mail blank absentee ballot request forms to registered Iowa voters. But auditors in Linn and Johnson counties have already announced plans to mail absentee ballot request forms pre-filled with the voter’s information as it appears in the database.
The League of United Latin American Citizens of Iowa and the group Majority Forward have filed a lawsuit in Johnson County District Court where they’ve asked a judge to declare the law unconstitutional.
\u00ab\u00a0This unnecessary barrier to absentee voting would be overly burdensome during ordinary times. However, these are not ordinary times. We are in the middle of a global pandemic,\u00a0\u00bb said Jazmin Newton, deputy state director for LULAC Iowa.
The Republican Party of Iowa, the Trump campaign and other Republican-aligned groups have intervened in the Iowa lawsuit, asking the judge to dismiss it.
Republican Party of Iowa Chairman Jeff Kaufmann said in a statement to the Register that the president did not actually call for the election to be delayed, but his \u00ab\u00a0frustrations with maintaining the integrity of our elections are felt by Iowans as well.\u00a0\u00bb
\u00ab\u00a0Iowans understand that we must always be diligent about upholding election laws,\u00a0\u00bb he said. \u00ab\u00a0But Democrats are using this pandemic to play politics \u2014 even right here in Iowa, we have rogue county auditors openly violating the law. It\u2019s important that every vote is counted in a fair, responsible, and lawful manner.\u00a0\u00bb
Brianne Pfannenstiel is the chief politics reporter for the Register. Reach her at bpfann@dmreg.com or 515-284-8244. Follow her on Twitter at @brianneDMR.
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