The outrage and condemnation came fast in September when President Donald Trump encouraged his supporters to commit voter fraud. “Let them send [a mail-in ballot] in, and let them go vote,” Trump said in Wilmington, N.C., urging backers to test the mechanics of North Carolina’s system by voting twice. A U.S. President encouraging citizens to commit a felony is alarming enough, but in the next breath, Trump acknowledged intentions that were arguably more pernicious: he said Republicans in the state would also fight in court to halt “unsolicited votes.”
“Unsolicited votes” indeed. Trump has a tendency to say the quiet part out loud, but in Wilmington, he was practically shouting that not all votes are created equal. And in North Carolina in particular, that means one thing: suppress Black voters. This election cycle, Trump allies have gone to court to defend a restrictive voter-ID law and to make it more difficult for voters to correct mistakes on mail-in ballots. Those measures have been shown to disproportionately affect Black voters.
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