Calling All “Constitutional Conservatives” to Stand Up for Democracy

Trump’s unconstitutional push to postpone the election reveals rank hypocrisy among WA GOP

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE | July 30, 2020

SEATTLE — Lying about the integrity of our elections is not a new tactic for Trump when he’s facing bad poll numbers, but suggesting he could exploit his failure to contain the pandemic to delay the general election is a dangerous escalation of that rhetoric.

Of course, like so many of Trump’s lies on Twitter meant to distract from America’s world-leading 150,000 coronavirus deaths and an historic collapse of the economy, Trump’s casual assault on our democracy is unlikely to result in actual policy change. Thanks to an overwhelming rejection of Trump’s racist fearmongering and administration-wide incompetence in 2018, Trump’s party does not control both houses of Congress where a change to the general election date would need to be passed by law.

Instead, all Trump’s pathetic conspiracy theorizing on Twitter has accomplished is proving the widespread hypocrisy of Washington state Republicans. Despite repeated attempts to wrap themselves in the Constitution when refusing to enforce laws passed by a majority of Washington voters or protect domestic terrorists, not a single Washington Republican has stood up to the president to rebuke him for attempting to usurp power expressly given to Congress to set the date of nationwide elections. 

Not even our state’s chief elections official and most senior statewide Republican elected official Kim Wyman has spoken out to rebut the president’s latest lies about the security of the system she’s asking voters to trust her to manage. Her silence is deafening.

“Day after day, the WA GOP proves that they have no interest in protecting our public health, protecting our economy, or protecting our democracy. They have only one goal: protect their president at all costs,” said Tina Podlodowski, Chair of the Washington State Democratic Party. “What Trump will learn in just 96 days is that — for the first time in his life — he can’t bribe or bully his way out of accountability for his massive failures.”