Eric Holder Sees Coronavirus As ‘Opportunity’ To Redesign US Election System

Eric Holder thinks the COVID-19 pandemic is a great opportunity to fundamentally change the way America votes.

“Coronavirus gives us an opportunity to revamp our electoral system so that it permanently becomes more inclusive and becomes easier for the American people to access,” Holder told Time magazine.

And as the Washington Examiner‘s Andrew Mark Miller notes, the former Obama Attorney General thinks mail-in ballots are the solution.

“There has to be a sea change in our thinking there,” Holder told the magazine, adding “Allow people to access their primary American right by voting at home. It’s not as if this is an untried concept. Oregon has been doing this for years. But we have to make sure that we’re being sensitive to the needs of poor communities and communities of color by doing things like having prepaid postage on envelopes. Construct a system so that you’ve got expanded in-person voting, you’ve got expanded at-home voting and expanded no-excuse absentee vote-at-home measures.”

The changes, according to Holder, will help “enhance our democracy.”

Democrats across the country have been pushing for increased mail-in voting during the coronavirus crisis despite reports over the past week suggesting over 28 million mail-in ballots have been lost in the past 10 years and that thousands of ineligible voters could possibly receive mail-in ballots, including many dead people.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson said on his show this week he believes these efforts to push mail-in voting are part of a broader effort on behalf of Democrats to “encourage” voter fraud to win elections. –Washington Examiner

The push for mail-in ballots has gained steam in Congress, with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) suggesting that the new system would “remove all obstacles to participation” in the 2020 election.

Trump and GOP lawmakers have suggested that the scheme is a politically motivated power-grab – warning that the system is “corrupt” and would invite widespread fraud.

“They grab thousands of mail-in ballots and they dump it,” Trump told reporters earlier this month, adding that vote-by-mail “doesn’t work out for Republicans.”

Republicans should fight very hard when it comes to state wide mail-in voting. Democrats are clamoring for it. Tremendous potential for voter fraud, and for whatever reason, doesn’t work out well for Republicans. @foxandfriends

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 8, 2020

Holder and Pelosi are joined by House Majority Whip Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC) reportedly suggesting in a March conference call that coronavirus presents political opportunities – referring to it as a “tremendous opportunity to restructure things to fit our vision.”