UPDATE Trump and DeJoy: A Clear & Present Danger to Our Right to Freely Vote

Trump Plan: Delay or lose your ballot - but not his

(Also, not Melania’s or anyone close to him)

Trump's co-conspirator PMG Louis DeJoy

(Maybe not DeJoy’s words, but clearly his message)

Short Major Update (August 17) from Bloomberg – President Donald J. Trump said management changes at the U.S. Postal Service that have been blamed for mail delays across the country are aimed at addressing what he called a long-term “disaster” in its finances. 

He said on Fox (naturally): “This isn’t a Trump thing. This has been one of the disasters of the world, the way it’s been run. What am I supposed to do, let it continue to be run badly?”

My hint to what you are supposed to do, Mr. President:

No need to keep it running badly. Just pitch in and help fix the damn thing but not the way you and PMG DeJoy are doing by wrecking and dismantling the whole system and harming the public along the way.

Here try this – it’s called leadership:

First: Stop making weak-ass excuses for your inaction while blaming everyone in sight.

Second: ID the problem and fix it.

Third: Stop punishing the entire country who relies on their mail like checks mailed to them, Rx’s mailed to them, critical bills, their banking documents, and all kinds of critical notices sent to them.

Finally: Stop exacerbating this problem the way you and DeJoy are doing by taking an M-1 tank to hunt down one mosquito.  

That’s what you are supposed to do, Mr. President – you are after all “the bigtime problem solver” right? That’s what you brag about 24/7.

Trump went on to say House Speaker Pelosi’s announcement that she’ll bring members back to Washington this week to vote on legislation to shore up the Postal Service’s finances was a “con game.” 

He added this about Democratic lawmakers: “The Post Office, there’s $25 billion sitting there, but they really want $1 trillion to bail out their badly run states.” 

Oh, that’s rich: Him calling people who really provide leadership a “con” while he is con master. Ask his voting base about “cons,” e.g., they trust his every word about “fake news” he hammers while swallowing his line.

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ORIGINAL POST (AUGUST 16) FROM HERE:

Trump’s assault on the USPS is like another Biblical “locust plague (Schistocerca gregaria) attacking every one of us on our constitutional right to vote freely, safely, and securely.

If you want more proof of Donald J. Trump’s raw hypocrisy – brother, this is it from USA TODAY article (August 13). That full story is here with this headline:

“President Trump requests mail-in ballot for upcoming Florida primary, despite rhetoric”

The highlights (with my emphasis in RED):

For the second time as a Palm Beach County voter, President Donald J. Trump has requested a vote-by-mail ballot ahead of the FL primary election on Tuesday (August 18). His request for mail-in ballots was for himself and first lady Melania Trump (re: The Palm Beach County election website).

The very next day (August 14) Trump told Fox Business Network that holding back money from the U.S. Postal Service, sought by Democrats in a relief package that is stuck in Congress, would hamper mail-in voting, which now he apparently advocates, saying specifically: “If we don’t make a deal, that means they don’t get the money. That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting; they just can’t have it.”

Noteworthy: The Trump ballots would now will have to be picked up, and not mailed to his Palm Beach private club, Mar-a-Lago, because the  deadline to send out ballots has passed. Now their ballot requests must travel back to Washington, DC.

Then Trump and his wife can (or not) mark their choices for seven races, which one race is for his local congressional seat, currently held by Democrat Lois Frankel.

The Trump ballots must be returned to the Palm Beach County’s elections office outside West Palm Beach before 7 p.m. Tuesday (August 18) when all mail-in ballots must be submitted.

There’s no word from the White House if they are entrusting the task to the recently maligned U.S. Postal Service or a personal currier. If by hand, who will carry the ballots and who will pay the cost?

In tweets, the president has lamented, without evidence, rampant fraud with mail-in ballots and even suggested the November election be delayed over coronavirus concerns. That can only be done by an act of Congress, though.

Note: More voters are opting to vote by mail to avoid voting in person.

Trump has blasted vote-by-mail — particularly universal vote-by-mail, where elections offices automatically send ballots to all registered voters, rather than allowing the onus to be on the voter to request a mail ballot.

Trump singled out Florida as an exception Tweeting that his supporters there should request an absentee ballot and vote by mail because the election system in the Republican-run battleground state is: “Safe and Secure, Tried and True.” (Note: Now that FL is his official residence for voting - oh, well that explains a lot, um?).

Trump has opposed financing for the U.S. Postal Service, which he linked to Democrats and them favoring mail-in voting, saying on Fox: “They need that money in order to have the post office work so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots. If they don’t get those two items, that means you can’t have universal mail-in voting because they’re not equipped to have it. More voters are opting to vote by mail to avoid voting in person.”

Critical Point: Florida lawmakers changed the legal wording from “absentee” to “vote-by-mail” in 2016 to alleviate confusion, since voters weren’t required to be away from home to cast their ballot.

Trump became a Palm Beach County voter in October, when he changed his permanent address from New York to his Mar-a-Lago home in Palm Beach.

While Trump had an opportunity to vote in Palm Beach for the March presidential primary, he instead requested a vote-by-mail ballot and had an affiliate pick it up eight days before Election Day. Now, critics fear his attacks are aimed at slowing mail-in voting when more voters are voting by mail-in avoid in-person voting during a pandemic.

My 2 cents: Again we have solid proof positive that Donald J. Trump is a “Clear and Present” danger to the nation, and he is a 100% hypocrite to not only to voting by mail-in (vs. simple absentee) system but he is a danger to our entire democracy, history, U.S. mail system, and nation as a whole and that is not merely my view, opinion, guess, or hunch, either. 

It is based on the facts, his words, his actions, his proposals, and his actual policies at this critical moment in time in the middle of this pandemic. 

Folks: That cannot be disputed or dismissed by a string of raw, rabid partisan BS statements from him or his sycophants, either. 

Also, this news on Louis DeJoy: DeJoy became the new postmaster general in June, replacing Megan Brennan, a career Postal Service employee who retired earlier this year. He has donated more than $620,000 to Republican candidates and committees so far this year, including more than $360,000 to Trump's 2020 reelection campaign, according to the FEC. 

He also donated more than $440,000 to the Trump campaign and the RNC in 2016.  Worth Noting: DeJoy and his wife hold up to $75,815,000 in assets from U.S. Postal Service competitors (re: Government disclosure files). 

Government ethics experts also told USA TODAY that nothing requires the PMG to divest such assets, except perhaps where a specific conflict of interest arises. 

So, if stopping or slowing down the entire USPS system (while he favors privatizing it and holding private mail contractor investments) is not a conflict of interest, then what the Hell is a conflict? 

Thanks for stopping by.