Trump tweet: Biden is making an attempt to “STEAL the election.” Yeah … no.

The presidential election is way from over, although the president would really like everybody to assume in any other case.

Early Tuesday morning, President Donald Trump tried to prematurely declare victory within the election in a tweet that was flagged by Twitter for spreading deceptive data.

“We’re up BIG, however they’re making an attempt to STEAL the Election,” Trump tweeted. “We are going to by no means allow them to do it. Votes can’t be solid after the Polls are closed!”

However no person is casting votes after the polls have closed. Quite the opposite, as famous by Daniel Dale of CNN, states like Pennsylvania are merely following lawful processes for tallying mail ballots postmarked by Election Day.

Trump’s tweet got here proper across the identical time that Joe Biden delivered a short speech in Delaware through which he referred to his obvious victory in Arizona, a swing within the Georgia tabulations in his favor, and his confidence within the Pennsylvania outcomes, which prompted him to say, “I’m right here to let you know tonight we consider we’re on monitor to win this election.”

“We are able to know the outcomes as early as tomorrow morning … [but] it’s not my place or Donald Trump’s place to declare who gained this election. That’s the choice of the American individuals,” Biden added.

Trump, nonetheless, wasted no time indicating that he does assume it’s his place to proclaim himself the victor, at the same time as a variety of states proceed to tally lawfully solid ballots.

Trump has lengthy telegraphed his plans to problem mail ballots

Trump and his marketing campaign have spent months signaling that if issues didn’t work out for the president on the poll field, authorized challenges to mail ballots could be his last-ditch try to remain in energy — although the experiences of states starting from Utah to Florida illustrate that mail voting is just not significantly weak to fraud.

Feedback made on Sunday by Trump marketing campaign official Jason Miller and the president illustrated how Trumpworld wasn’t actually making an attempt to cover what they hoped to do. On ABC’s This Week, Miller dismissed the concept that all ballots needs to be tallied, portray it as a Democratic effort to “steal” the election — and indicated that Trump’s technique is to prematurely declare victory.

“If you happen to converse with many good Democrats, they consider that Trump might be forward on election night time, most likely getting 280 electoral [votes], someplace in that vary, after which they’re gonna attempt to steal it again after the election,” Miller mentioned.

Miller’s feedback alluded to the so-called “purple mirage,” or Republicans showing to take an early lead on election night time as in-person votes are tallied forward of mail ones, which had been extra in demand this yr than ever earlier than due to the coronavirus pandemic. As my colleague Jen Kirby defined, “It might appear like Trump and different Republican candidates are on the verge of successful in some states on election night time, just for Biden and Democrats to surge forward after extra mail-in ballots are counted.” That’s principally what may very well be occurring in Georgia, the place as-yet-uncounted votes within the Atlanta space have Biden in place to beat Trump’s early lead within the tally.

Later Sunday, Trump was much more particular, telling reporters that “we’re going to go within the night time of, as quickly as that election is over [in Pennsylvania], we’re getting into with our attorneys … if individuals needed to get their ballots in, they need to have gotten their ballots in lengthy earlier than that.”

In actuality, Pennsylvania prohibits mail ballots from being tallied till when polls shut on election night time (Democrats tried to alter this within the runup to this yr’s election however had been blocked by Republicans). There’s nothing fraudulent about this; quite the opposite, tallying ballots after polls shut is what state legislation requires.

It needs to be famous that simply because the Trump marketing campaign recordsdata a authorized problem to mail ballots doesn’t imply that such a problem might be profitable. To quote one current instance, final month, US District Decide J. Nicholas Ranjan, a Trump appointee, dominated towards a Trump marketing campaign problem to Pennsylvania’s mail voting guidelines. However as my colleague Ian Millhiser detailed final month, two US Supreme Courtroom justices nominated by Trump — Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh — signaled of their concurring opinions in Democratic Nationwide Committee v. Wisconsin State Legislature that they could be sympathetic to Trump administration challenges of state election legal guidelines that the president doesn’t like.

The specifics of any attainable authorized problem Trump is planning to make to the election outcomes stays to be seen. However the tone of his Tuesday morning tweet was rapidly echoed by Republican Nationwide Committee spokesperson Elizabeth Harrington, who insinuated that Biden is making an attempt to steal the election. (Satirically, on the identical time they’re calling for the tip of vote tallying in Pennsylvania, the Trump marketing campaign is demanding all of the votes be counted in Arizona, the place Trump is projected to lose.)

However that’s under no circumstances what Biden is making an attempt to do. All he desires is for all of the votes to be counted. Trump and his enablers, nonetheless, appear extra excited by successful than they’re in having a free and truthful election.