北卡罗来纳州的州选举官员周四拒绝了唐纳德·特朗普总统要求支持者通过邮件和亲自投票来“测试系统”的呼吁
“国家委员会办公室强烈反对人们在选举日出现在投票站检查他们的缺席选票是否被计算在内。北卡罗莱纳州选举委员会执行主任卡伦·布林森·贝尔在一份声明中说，这是不必要的，这会导致更长的线路和新冠肺炎蔓延的可能性。
特朗普长期以来一直试图破坏公众对即将到来的大选的信心选举毫无根据地警告说邮寄投票会导致广泛的选民欺诈。
周三，在竞争激烈的北卡罗莱纳州，他鼓励人们通过邮件投票，然后在选举日也去投票站投票，因为冠状病毒正在流行，以便亲自核实他们的投票已经被计算在内。
“他们将投票，然后他们将不得不通过去投票站投票来检查他们的投票，因为如果投票站列表，那么他们将不能这样做。所以，让他们发过来，让他们去投票吧。”
他继续说:“如果这个系统像他们说的那样好，那么他们显然就不能投票了。如果没有列表，他们可以投票。这就是他们应该做的。”
投票两次是违法的。尽管各州的选举法各不相同，但在北卡罗莱纳州，这将构成一级重罪。
奥巴马总统在周四上午的一系列推文中对他的评论进行了限定，称他敦促人们核实他们邮寄的选票在选举日之前已经统计过了，如果没有，就亲自去投票站投票。
“确保您的投票被统计，尽早在您的选票上签名并邮寄”，然后亲自前往“您的投票站”查看您的邮寄选票是否已被列表(统计)。如果有，你将不能投票&邮件系统工作正常。如果没有计算在内，请投票(这是公民的权利)。”
针对邮寄的选票可能无法在选举日之前统计的可能性，总统将一个人在同一次选举中投了两票从而无意中犯下欺诈行为的可能性降至最低，称第二张选票“不会被使用或统计。”
特朗普说:“如果您的邮寄选票在您投票后到达(这是不应该的)，该选票将不会被使用或计算在内，因为您的选票已经投出并制成表格。”
几小时后，推特附加通知其中两条推文称，他们“鼓励人们有可能投票两次”违反了政府的政策。
在总统周四早上发布推特之前，白宫新闻秘书凯丽·麦克纳尼断然否认总统建议人们应该尝试两次投票。
麦克纳尼在福克斯新闻上说:“总统并没有建议任何人做任何违法的事情。”“他说得很清楚，那就是确保你的投票是列表式的。如果不是，那就投票。当你收到一张缺席选票，并把它寄出时，会有投票簿，上面记录着你的投票情况，如果你出现在投票站，他们会看着投票簿，说你的投票已经被计算在内。”
格里·布鲁姆/美联社
2020年9月2日，唐纳德·特朗普总统在北卡罗来纳州威尔明顿发表演讲后离开舞台
司法部长比尔·巴尔周三在接受美国有线电视新闻网采访时被要求解释总统的评论，他说他不确定总统到底是什么意思，但没有完全否定这个想法。
巴尔说:“我不知道他到底在说什么，但在我看来，他说的是，他试图表明，监测这个系统的能力并不好。”“如果真的很好，如果你想第二次投票，如果你亲自投票，你会被抓住的。”
德鲁·安格雷尔/盖蒂影像公司
2020年8月4日，在华盛顿特区艾森豪威尔行政办公楼的印第安人条约室，司法部长威廉·巴尔在一次活动中倾听，强调司法部对打击人口贩运的拨款
奥巴马发表上述言论之际，一项又一项民调显示，他落后于民主党对手乔·拜登，并因应对冠状病毒大流行而受到审查。冠状病毒大流行已导致美国600多万人感染，近18.5万人死亡。
总统的评论是总统长达数月的修辞活动的最新进展，旨在削弱公众对即将到来的选举的信任。他毫不留情地重复了未经证实的说法，即冠状病毒导致的邮寄投票的预期增加可能导致2020年成为“历史上最大的舞弊选举。”
特朗普预见到自己对欺诈的预测，拒绝承诺如果事情不按他的方式发展，就接受选举结果。
特朗普上个月在威斯康辛州表示:“我们输掉这场选举的唯一途径就是这场选举是否受到操纵。”
全国各地的专家和选举官员都反对总统的断言，即邮寄投票可能会破坏选举。
美国公民自由联盟投票权项目主任戴尔·何告诉美国广播公司新闻:“通过邮件投票不是一种新的、未经测试的创新。”“自内战以来，我们一直在这个国家使用它。我认为超过80%的美国人生活在承诺让每个合格选民在11月通过邮件投票的州。所以这不是什么新的或者疯狂的事情。这是这个国家的人民已经做了一个多世纪的事情。”
美国广播公司新闻联系了所有50个州的选举当局，请他们对特朗普的主张进行评估。在7月份提供了记录在案的答复的近30位国务卿和选举委员会办公室中，没有人对他们国家保护今年11月选举完整性的能力表示怀疑。
North Carolina officials reject Trump's call for supporters to vote by mail and in person
State election officials in North Carolina on Thursday rejected President Donald Trump's call for supporters to vote to both vote by mail and in person to "test the system."
"The State Board office strongly discourages people from showing up at the polls on Election Day to check whether their absentee ballot was counted. That is not necessary, and it would lead to longer lines and the possibility of spreading COVID-19, Karen Brinson Bell, executive director of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, said in a statement.
Trump has long sought to undermine public confidence in the upcomingelectionwith baseless warnings that mail-in-voting could lead to widespread voter fraud.
In the battleground state of North Carolina Wednesday, he encouraged people to vote by mail and then also go to the polls on Election Day, amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, in order to personally verify that their vote has been counted.
“They will vote and then they are going to have to check their vote by going to the poll and voting that way because if it tabulates then they won’t be able to do that. So, let them send it in, and let them go vote,” Trump said Wednesday in an interview with a North Carolina news station WECT.
He continued: “And if the system is as good as they say it is, then they obviously won’t be able to vote. If it isn’t tabulated, they will be able to vote. So that’s the way it is, and that’s what they should do.”
It is illegal to vote twice. And while election laws vary by state, it would amount to a Class I felony offense in North Carolina.
The president qualified his comments in a series of tweets Thursday morning, saying he is urging people to verify that their mailed ballots are counted by Election Day, and if not, to vote in person at the polls.
"MAKE SURE YOUR VOTE COUNTS & IS COUNTED, SIGN & MAIL IN your Ballot as EARLY as possible" and then to follow up being going in person "to your Polling Place to see whether or not your Mail In Vote has been Tabulated (Counted). If it has you will not be able to Vote & the Mail In System worked properly. If it has not been Counted, VOTE (which is a citizen’s right to do)."
Responding to the potential that a mailed-in ballot may not be counted by Election Day, the president minimized the potential for a person to inadvertently commit fraud by casting two votes in the same election, contending that the second ballot "will not be used or counted."
"If your Mail In Ballot arrives after you Vote, which it should not, that Ballot will not be used or counted in that your vote has already been cast & tabulated," Trump said
Within hours, Twitterappended noticesto two of these tweets, saying that they violated its policy by "encouraging people to potentially vote twice."
Before the president's tweets Thursday morning, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany emphatically denied that the president was suggesting people should try to have their vote casted twice.
"The president is not suggesting anyone do anything unlawful," McEnany said on Fox News. “What he said very clearly there is make sure your vote is tabulated. If it is not, then vote. When you get an absentee ballot and send it in there are poll books and it records that you have voted and if you show up at a polling site they look at the poll book and say your vote has been counted."
President Donald Trump leaves the stage after a speech, Sept. 2, 2020, in Wilmington, N.C.
Attorney General Bill Barr, asked to explain the president’s comments in an interview on CNN Wednesday, said he wasn’t sure exactly what the president meant but didn’t dismiss the idea outright.
"I don't know exactly what he was saying, but it seems to me what he's saying is, he's trying to make the point that the ability to monitor this system is not good," Barr said. "And if it was so good, if you tried to vote a second time you would be caught if you voted in person."
The president’s comments come as poll after poll show him trailing to his Democratic opponent Joe Biden and under scrutiny for his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, which has resulted in more than 6 million infections in the U.S. and nearly 185,000 deaths.
The president’s comments were the latest evolution in a months-long rhetorical campaign by the president to undercut public trust in the upcoming election. He has relentlessly repeated unsubstantiated claims that the expected increase in mail-in-voting due to the coronavirus could result in 2020 being the "most rigged election in history.”
Anticipating his predictions of fraud, Trump has declined to commit to accepting the results of the election if things don’t go his way.
"The only way we're going to lose this election is if this election is rigged," Trump said last month in Wisconsin.
Experts and election officials across the country have pushed back against the president’s assertion that mail-in voting could discredit an election.
“Voting by mail is not some kind of new, untested innovation,” Dale Ho, director of the ACLU's Voting Rights Project told ABC News. “We've been using it in this country since the Civil War. And I think over 80 percent of Americans live in states that have committed to letting every eligible voter cast a ballot by mail in November. So it's not something kind of new or crazy. It's been something that people in this country have been doing for over a century.”
ABC News reached out to elections authorities in all 50 states for their assessment of Trump's claims. Of the nearly 30 secretaries of state and elections board offices who provided on-the-record responses in July, none expressed doubts in their state's ability to protect the integrity of their elections this November.
