You don’t need to be an expert in electoral politics to understand Rule One of any campaign: Candidates should pursue as many votes as possible. In a democracy, it’s common sense: The more votes a campaign has, the greater the chance of success.
With this in mind, Donald Trump appears to have a counterintuitive rhetorical habit. The New Republic noted:
On Fox News Thursday morning, Donald Trump had a weird instruction for his supporters: they don’t have to vote. “My instruction: We don’t need the votes, I have so many votes,” Trump said on Fox & Friends before going on a rant about how much support he has in Florida.
As a clip from the show makes clear, the former president didn’t appear to be kidding: https://x.com/atrupar/status/1816482779581775943
If the phrasing sounded at all familiar, it’s not your imagination. The day after last month’s presidential debate, for example, Trump held a rally in Virginia and told attendees, “We don’t need votes.”
I don’t think they can do that, but I don’t doubt they’ll try
Trump has done literally hundreds of things he “can’t” do and only one person has come anywhere close to stopping him.
What are we gonna do, harangue each other about it? Easy there, we don’t disagree about anything. This is serious.
Merely voting is minimal effort. Last election I sent dozens of “vote forward” letters across the country. Will you?
https://votefwd.org/