{"id":14714,"date":"2025-08-19T15:52:39","date_gmt":"2025-08-19T15:52:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=14714"},"modified":"2025-08-19T16:18:05","modified_gmt":"2025-08-19T16:18:05","slug":"trump-is-already-plotting-to-steal-the-midterms-how-far-will-he-go","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=14714","title":{"rendered":"Trump Is Already Plotting to Steal the Midterms. How Far Will He Go?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>By <em>by Andrew Egger<\/em>, <em>THEBULWARK<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cbsn-fusion-trump-meets-with-zelenskyy-special-report-thumbnail-1024x576.webp\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-14717\" srcset=\"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cbsn-fusion-trump-meets-with-zelenskyy-special-report-thumbnail-1024x576.webp 1024w, https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cbsn-fusion-trump-meets-with-zelenskyy-special-report-thumbnail-300x169.webp 300w, https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cbsn-fusion-trump-meets-with-zelenskyy-special-report-thumbnail-768x432.webp 768w, https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cbsn-fusion-trump-meets-with-zelenskyy-special-report-thumbnail-1536x864.webp 1536w, https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cbsn-fusion-trump-meets-with-zelenskyy-special-report-thumbnail-678x381.webp 678w, https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cbsn-fusion-trump-meets-with-zelenskyy-special-report-thumbnail.webp 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><em>Trump vows to try banning mail-in voting before 2026 midterm elections.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Yesterday, in a <em>Bulwark Takes <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=amjErAc2cuY\">video<\/a>, JVL and I were discussing Donald Trump\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/truthsocial.com\/@realDonaldTrump\/posts\/115049974697549520\">ridiculous claim<\/a> that the federal takeover of policing Washington, D.C. had turned the capital from \u201cthe most unsafe \u2018city\u2019 in the United States\u201d into \u201cperhaps the safest\u201d in mere days, \u201cand getting better every single hour.\u201d The crackdown, JVL suggested, looked like a dry run for an even more consequential deployment later:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>Maybe we do a little bit of this in Philly the week before the election, right? Try to dissuade people from maybe turning out to vote in the midterm elections. . . . I don\u2019t see any reason why they couldn\u2019t shave a couple tenths of a point in turnout off by doing this sort of thing\u2014do you?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Old habits of mind die hard: In the moment, I wondered whether this analysis might be a touch <em>too <\/em>dismal. It was certainly clear that Trump has no intention of keeping his law-enforcement crackdown contained to D.C. But was there specific reason to believe he had an eye on using federal law-enforcement officers or National Guardsmen to meddle in elections?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was as if Trump said: <em>Buddy, I am SO glad you asked.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a Truth Social <a href=\"https:\/\/truthsocial.com\/@realDonaldTrump\/posts\/115049485680941254\">post<\/a> yesterday, the president launched the latest offensive in his forever war against mail-in and machine-tabulated voting. \u201cTHE MAIL-IN BALLOT HOAX, USING VOTING MACHINES THAT ARE A COMPLETE AND TOTAL DISASTER, MUST END, NOW!!!\u201d He intends to put a stop to it. He\u2019ll start, he says, with an executive order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"650\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ZfIZiPFymP8?si=8Ss6StALRwLKbLRF\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Disturbingly, there are <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/politics\/donald-trump\/trump-reignites-push-ban-mail-voting-meeting-putin-rcna225570\">reports<\/a> that Trump discussed mail-in voting with Vladimir Putin at their meeting in Alaska. But let\u2019s leave aside the intriguing question of why that conversation apparently prompted Trump\u2019s outburst, and instead ask: On what authority does the president intend to meddle in states\u2019 governance of their own elections? Well, let Trump give you the bone-chilling details:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>Remember, the States are merely an \u201cagent\u201d for the Federal Government in counting and tabulating the votes. They must do what the Federal Government, as represented by the President of the United States, tells them, FOR THE GOOD OF OUR COUNTRY, to do.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>In a sane world, it would probably \u2018matter\u2019 that these rants are utterly divorced from fact and law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Trump\u2019s claims that mail-in ballots and machine tabulation are rife with fraud are, as ever, utter bunk. (Amazingly, this post came on the exact same day that Newsmax <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/newshour\/politics\/newsmax-to-pay-67m-in-defamation-case-over-false-2020-election-claims\">agreed<\/a> to pay Dominion Voting Systems $67 million to settle a lawsuit over the voter-fraud lies it spread after the 2020 election. My question to the White House press office about whether Newsmax should have settled went unanswered.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But those tired old fraud claims are somehow even less outrageous than the genuinely insane <em>pr\u00e9cis<\/em> Trump is offering for how election systems interact under our system of government. Under the U.S. Constitution, it is the states, not the federal government, that run their various elections. Electing their representatives is the states\u2019 responsibility because those representatives serve under the states\u2019 authority. And the Constitution is crystal clear about which part of the federal government is permitted to get involved:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>The Times, Places, and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>To this Trump scoffs: <em>Well, that\u2019s just, like, your opinion, man<\/em>. He\u2019s got an alternate reading. In it, states are just pencil-pushing functionaries to whom the president has delegated some busy work. And they\u2019d better do it the way he tells them to if they know what\u2019s good for them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Back in the good old days (lol) of Trump\u2019s first term, this sort of spasm of naked fascist desire tended to surface and then recede without leaving too much of a mark on policy. Today, who would be so Pollyannaish as to predict that\u2019s what will happen here? The Constitution doesn\u2019t carry its own guns. But the National Guardsmen do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>By by Andrew Egger, THEBULWARK Yesterday, in a Bulwark Takes video, JVL and I were discussing Donald Trump&rsquo;s ridiculous claim that the federal takeover of policing Washington, D.C. had turned the capital from &ldquo;the most <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/?p=14714\" title=\"Trump Is Already Plotting to Steal the Midterms. How Far Will He Go?\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14718,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[94],"class_list":{"0":"post-14714","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-slider","8":"tag-2026-midterms"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14714"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14714\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14723,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14714\/revisions\/14723"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14718"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinosreadytovote.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}