'Not Possible Without An Act Of Congress': FIU Professor Says President Trump Doesn't Have Power To Delay Election
MIAMI (CBSMiami) – President Donald Trump is once again alleging in a tweet that universal vote-by-mail will lead the most "inaccurate and fraudulent election in history." He went on to pose the question about whether to "Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???"
"It's not possible without an act of Congress," explained Eduardo Gamarra, a professor of politics at FIU.
Gamarra said President Trump does not have the power to do that.
"An act of Congress along those lines is very improbable given the structure of the Senate dominated by Republicans and the structure of the House dominated by Democrats," he said.
Many voters believe elections should be held as scheduled.
"It doesn't look well for our democracy. It undermines it," said voter Zach Reh.
"It's ludicrous, but it's kinda become the new reality," said Mike Glasser.
Others, like Wayne Gage, share the president's fear of fraud.
"The push for mail-in balloting is just, I think, ultimately, very wicked and the intentions there are very evil," he said.
Democratic Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz said, "The President of the United States just suggested putting off an election because he's losing support. The American people will not stand for such authoritarianism."
Republican Sen. Marco Rubio is against the idea too.
A tweet from a CNN reporter quoted Sen. Rubio as saying, "I wish he hadn't said that, but it's not going to change: We are going to have an election in November."
South Florida has seen its share of voter fraud cases. A couple of the latest: 4 years ago when a temp worker at the Miami-Dade elections office was arrested and convicted of marking several ballots in favor of a mayoral candidate. Around the same time, another woman was arrested accused of Illegally filling out voter registration cards, some for dead people.
"I've been working in the elections department for over 14 years now, certainly there have been some cases, I can count them probably on one hand," said Miami-Dade Supervisor of Elections Christina White.
She and two county judges sit on the canvassing board. In a recent session, they looked at mail-in ballots that have problems — like signatures that don't match.
"When the ballot comes back to our department, we are confirming that it was you that voted it by comparing the signature on the ballot to the signature we have on record," she said, "just like when you go to vote in person we're checking your Id, we're checking your signature."
If you do plan to vote-by-mail in the August primary, there is still time to request a ballot, the deadline is August 8th.
