President Donald Trump gave a confusing answer as to why he seemed to shift his feelings on mail-in voting.
Trump, 80, was confronted on Monday about his apparent about-face on mail-in voting after he encouraged Republicans to do so in a video he shared on Truth Social on Saturday.
The president, who often votes by mail himself, has frequently bashed the practice as “inherently corrupt” and has tried to limit it throughout his second administration.
CBS News White House Correspondent Nancy Cordes pressed the president on why he would urge his supporters to vote by mail despite thinking it’s “fraud.”
“No—vote by mail or vote in person,” Trump replied. “I’d rather have them vote in person, but, uh, they can vote by mail if they want, because we seem to have no choice because, uhh, a lot of people want to vote by mail, but a lot of very good people also want to vote in person. You can do either.”
“What we’re concerned about is there seems to be a lot of—not seems to be—there is, a lot of cheating in vote by mail. A lot of cheating, all over,” he added.
But Cordes didn’t buy Trump’s explanation, asking him to provide evidence of his cheating claims.
“I’ll tell you what. Start off by taking a look at California,” he said, to which Cordes responded that there was no evidence of election fraud in the state.
“No evidence? With millions and millions of ballots?” Trump said. “You are fake news.”
The White House did not immediately return the Daily Beast’s request for comment.
Trump encouraged his supporters to vote by any means necessary ahead of the upcoming midterm elections, neglecting to hold firm in his stance against mail-in voting.
“Vote early. Vote by mail. Or vote in person on Election Day, November 3, so we can defeat the radical ‘Dumocrats’ in a midterm victory that is too big to rig,” Trump said in the video posted on Saturday.
The president’s executive efforts to restrict the practice have been impeded by the courts.
In August, a federal judge blocked the United States Postal Service from enacting rules that would allow the Trump administration to decide which voters could vote by mail in November.
Trump’s change in tune is likely in response to predictions of Democrats sweeping the midterms and overtaking the House and Senate majorities, putting his presidency in peril.
With elections less than a month away, the president seems to be pulling out all the stops to prevent a major Republican defeat.
