The presidential election is on November 3, but when asked if it would still be held then, Jared Kushner, the US president’s son-in-law and White House senior advisor, was not fully committal.
It is not possible for the White House to unilaterally postpone an election — although Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, has worried it is something that President Trump might well try.
Trump could, however, publicly undermine the legitimacy of the vote, as he has done with baseless claims that casting ballots by mail will enable widespread fraud.
Asked today if he could see pushing back the vote, Kushner told TIME that November was “too far in the future to tell.”
“It’s not my decision to make, so I’m not sure I can commit one way or the other,” he said. “But right now that’s the plan.”
It seemed to disregard provisions of the Constitution that give only the states and Congress, not the president, the power to delay a presidential election, according to the National Constitution Center.
“Unlike the practice of some states that allow the Governor to postpone an election during emergencies, neither the Constitution nor Congress provides any similar power to the President or other federal officials to change this date outside of Congress’s regular legislative process,” reads an article on the center’s web site, quoting a report from the Congressional Research Service. “The presidential election date has never been changed in response to an emergency.”
Kushner had been asked if another surge in coronavirus infections could delay the election.
“Hopefully by the time we get to September, October, November, we’ve done enough work with testing and with all the different things we’re trying to do to prevent a future outbreak of the magnitude that would make us shut down again,” he said. “I really believe that once America opens up, it’ll be very hard for America to lock down again.”
Kushner’s response, allowing for the possibility of a delay, sounded like a Trump campaign trial balloon launched earlier this week.
The date of the general election is set by federal law and has been fixed since 1845.
It would take a change in federal law to move that date.
That would mean legislation enacted by Congress, signed by the president and subject to challenge in the courts.
To call that unlikely would be an understatement.