Trump defends his mail voting hypocrisy: ‘I’m president of the United States’

President Donald Trump Thursday defended his decision to cast another ballot by mail in recent Florida special elections, despite relentlessly attacking the voting method as a vehicle for election fraud.

His defense? “I’m the president of the United States.”

Trump has called on congressional Republicans to include restrictions on no-excuse mail voting in the severely anti-voting SAVE America Act. During a public cabinet meeting, PBS NewsHour reporter Liz Landers asked him why he chose to vote by mail if the method is as unreliable and fraudulent as he claims it is. 

“And because of the fact I’m president of the United States, I did a mail-in ballot for elections that took place in Florida because I felt like I should be here instead of being in the beautiful sun,” Trump said. 

After the reporter pointed out that he’d been in Florida the past few weekends and could have voted in person, Trump falsely claimed that the state had exceptions for people away on business trips.

In reality, Florida is a no-excuse mail voting state, meaning any voter can request a mail ballot. But if Republicans follow the president’s lead and include a proposed ban on no-excuse mail voting in the SAVE America Act, Trump likely would not have qualified for his recent mail ballot if the bill became law.

“So, I was away, mostly in Washington, D.C., so I used a mail-in ballot, but I don’t appreciate the question,” Trump, who has regularly voted by mail in the past, added. 

Just a day before Florida’s special election, Trump called mail voting “mail-in cheating.”

“I call it mail-in cheating,” Trump said at an appearance in Memphis, Tennessee. “And we got to do something about it all.”