The Partisan Showdown Over Mail-In Voting Has Only Just Begun
Wisconsin’s election fiasco suggests the battle over postal ballots will get even uglier in November’s election.
Voters line up at Milwaukee’s Riverside High School for Wisconsin’s primary election on April 7.
Photographer: Morry Gash/AP Photo
Jarring scenes on April 7 in Milwaukee—where long lines of masked voters waited outside polling stations—could repeat nationwide in November, as the Republican Party digs in against a growing Democratic consensus that the presidential election should be conducted primarily by mail if the novel coronavirus persists.
Republicans and Democrats have been divided for years over how easy it should be to vote. Democrats push for wider access through simple registration on the assumption that high turnout works to their party’s benefit. Republicans, citing the risk of fraud, call for stricter voter ID rules. (Five states mail ballots to all voters. An additional 28 allow mail voting without a special reason, but they require voters to apply for a ballot.) Now the public-health response to Covid-19 appears to support the Democrats’ approach, and Republicans are fighting back.