I think mail-in ballots going from 34 million in 2016 to 67 million in 2020 was a much larger reason. And that is the only "anomaly" that alarms me.
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I think mail-in ballots going from 34 million in 2016 to 67 million in 2020 was a much larger reason. And that is the only "anomaly" that alarms me.
I think that fact is entirely expected with greater partisanship, higher turnout, and covid-19.
its certainly expected with COVID 19. I don't think we can say that partisanship changed enough to result in a 200% increase in mail in votes.
And moving from in person voting to mail in voting is inherently less secure. So there's that issue that some people go "hmmm".
This is the "Big Lie" ,that there is nothing to look at in this election
this election clearly must have been rigged against Joe Biden.
it is simply impossible that 74 million people could ever be stupid enough to vote for someone like trump.
Not by itself, no. But with just covid-19, and turnout/motivation (more people voted for Trump in 2020 vs. 2016, and yet he still lost by more votes), I wouldn't have been much surprised if mail-in voting had been 300% higher.
That is the common sense view, all other things being held constant.*
In the case of mail-in voting, there are confounding variables, like greater oversight (which all states reported), and evidence of that inherent vulnerability having actually been exploited was not discovered.
* The common sense view continues to hold that calories in calories out is the reason we gain or lose weight. Common sense views being challenged and even debunked is why Freakonomics became popular.
The thing is many people who would not vote by going out or cannot be bothered suddenly vote because the mail in process is easier than standing in long lines depending on where you live. The politics of the past few years was so polarizing we saw an uptick in voter participation on BOTH sides if you look at votes received by Trump and Biden. Both received record number of votes.
I think many people stayed away in 2016 thinking erroneously it was a slam dunk (not sure why) and they were not going to make the same mistake again. Trump won MI, WI and PA by very slim margins which many people forget was the actual margin of victory in the 2016 election.
That means both sides were going to mobilize their bases in a major way. I think COVID and the scare made a lot of people who vote normally simply switch to mail in. I went in person and it was EMPTY. I am pretty sure most of the people that usually go to my polling place simply decided to mail it in. Imagine that happening in districts all over the country.
the problem is the system is not set up for mail in voting in such a large scale. In every election votes are still counted after Election Day due to mail in votes but the numbers are smaller. The next big election is in 2022 and COVID should NOT be a factor and neither should mail in voting at all.
In the long run mail in votes will still be mainly for overseas/military/disabled etc...
2022 will be a large GOP mobilization and with COVID going to be 2 years behind us at that point...I think it will be a more normal election.
I hope you are right about the future. To think everyone can mail in a ballot that isn't verified though a solid system doesn't bode well.
The media will stop scaring people with COVID in 2022 so I think...hope.... we get normal voting patterns within person. There still may be an uptick in mail in votes versus 2016 but hopefully way less than 2020. The quick solution is to invest in more machines to have more polling places so that you dont have super long lines in densely populated areas. Also more machines for EARLY voting which is done in person on machines just like election day.
Also put machines all along the border so newly crossing people can vote as they climb over the wall
