Trump casts Florida mail ballot as he pushes Congress to severely limit
that voting option
[March 25, 2026]
By BILL BARROW
President Donald Trump has cast another mail ballot in Florida as he
continues to publicly bash the voting method as a source of fraud and
push Congress to curtail the practice.
Palm Beach County voter records show the president voted by mail in a
Tuesday special election for state legislative seats and that his ballot
has been counted. Early in-person voting in the contest ran through
Sunday, when Trump was still at his south Florida estate.
The White House said Tuesday that Trump's ire is at states using
universal mail-in voting, not individual instances of voters needing
accommodations to vote by mail. A spokeswoman pushed back specifically
at the idea that his voting practice contradicts his push for new
federal voting rules.
“As President Trump has said, the SAVE America Act has commonsense
exceptions for Americans to use mail-in ballots for illness, disability,
military, or travel – but universal mail-in voting should not be allowed
because it’s highly susceptible to fraud,” said White House spokeswoman
Olivia Wales in a statement.
A report by the Brookings Institution published in 2025 found that cases
of mail voting fraud occurred in only 0.000043% of total mail ballots
cast, or about four cases out of every 10 million mail votes.
Wales added: “As everyone knows, the President is a resident of Palm
Beach and participates in Florida elections, but he obviously primarily
lives at the White House in Washington, D.C. This is a non-story.”
Nonetheless, Trump has in the last week called mail-in voting “cheating"
and “corrupt as hell.” He is urging Congress to pass the SAVE Act. The
sweeping bill would bar universal mail ballots and, as Wales noted,
limit the options to a select few voters such as those with
disabilities, military commitments or who are traveling on Election Day.
The measure faces steep odds in the closely divided Senate even with the
president's pressure.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer tried to capitalize on the
president's voting choice.
“According to Donald Trump, vote by mail is cheating when other people
use it, but perfectly fine when he does it himself,” Schumer, D-N.Y.,
said on the Senate floor.
Trump has fixated on mail ballots since he began falsely claiming that
his 2020 presidential election loss to Democrat Joe Biden was the result
of fraud. Multiple U.S. courts and Trump's own attorney general have
found no evidence of fraud that affected the outcome, despite the
COVID-19 pandemic increasing the share of the electorate that cast mail
ballots that year.
“We’re the only country in the world that does it that way. Corrupt as
hell,” Trump said last week at the White House when hosting Irish Prime
Minister Micheál Martin.
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President Donald Trump walks down the stairs of Air Force One upon
his arrival at Joint Base Andrews, Md., Monday, March 23, 2026. (AP
Photo/Luis M. Alvarez)
Dozens of countries, including European democracies that are
traditional U.S. allies, use some form of mail-in voting.
Trump said last week that the SAVE Act was the “biggest thing”
pending in Washington, even as Congress and administration grapple
with the Iran war and a partial shutdown of the Department of
Homeland Security.
Last August, Trump used a White House meeting with Ukrainian
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to blast mail voting.
“We’re going to start with an executive order that’s being written
right now by the best lawyers in the country to end mail-in ballots
because they’re corrupt,” Trump said. “And it’s time that the
Republicans get tough and stop it because the Democrats want it.
It’s the only way they can get elected.”
The president, who changed his official personal residence and voter
registration from New York to Florida during his first term, does
not have a standing vote-by-mail request for all elections,
according to the county records. That means he has to request a mail
ballot for any individual election.
The ballot today includes Florida state House District 87 and Senate
District 14.
Trump offered an endorsement late Monday in the House contest via
his Truth Social platform.
“There is a very important Special Election tomorrow, Tuesday, March
24th, for Florida State House District 87 in beautiful Palm Beach
County. ... TO ALL GREAT PATRIOTS IN FLORIDA STATE HOUSE DISTRICT
87: GET OUT AND VOTE FOR JON MAPLES! Polls are open from 7:00 A.M.
to 7:00 P.M.” Trump wrote, without mentioning that he had voted by
mail or at all.
Republican Maples lost Tuesday to Democrat Emily Gregory in the
district, which includes Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate.
The Florida election comes one day after the Supreme Court heard
oral arguments in a Mississippi case questioning whether states can
count mail-in ballots that are postmarked by Election Day but not
received until later. Trump has criticized those allowances in 14
states and the District of Columbia.
—-
Barrow reported from Atlanta. Associated Press reporter Stephen
Groves contributed from Washington.
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