President Donald Trump demanded a mail-in ballot to vote in Florida's upcoming primary the day before publicly refusing support to meet an anticipated increase in Americans voting by mail at this year's presidential election.
The election website for Palm Beach County, Fla., where Trump is eligible to vote, reveals on Wednesday that the president and first lady Melania Trump were being asked for mail-in ballots. USA Today first published the story.
According to the election supervisor of the district, the ballots will need to be picked up in person because the deadline for them to be mailed has already passed. In other states where ballots will be post-marked by election day for counting, the Trumps will return theirs by the primary date of next Tuesday.
Trump railed Thursday against voting-by-mail, claiming he opposes vital U.S. funding. Postal Service is part of a November campaign to deter People from voting by mail.
The president has consistently demonized mail-in voting as governors around the country have sought to broaden it in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, but has indicated previously that certain cases, like his, are allowable.
"If you're US president and vote in Florida, and you can't be there, you should be allowed to send in a ballot," Trump said in May.
Last week, the Sun Sentinel announced that Floridians were on track to break records for mail-in voting during the Democratic and Republican primaries of the state. As of Aug. 5, more than 1.2 million residents of the state had voted by mail, a figure estimated to eclipse the 1.35 million people who voted by mail in 2018.
Despite falsely alleging that voting by mail leads to increased voter fraud, Trump previously praised voting by mail in Florida, in a tweet earlier this month calling the state's election system "safe and efficient."
"Florida's electoral system has been cleaned up (we defeated efforts by the Democrats to change), and I urge everyone in Florida to submit a ballot & vote by mail!" Trump said.
Trump became a registered Florida voter after moving from New York in October 2019 from his citizenship to the territory.