
As Republicans, most of us are pretty opposed to the idea of ballot harvesting. It is a Democratic pastime, after all. But as this GOP candidate just made clear, it’s something we shouldn’t be above doing.
Florida’s Governor and Republican presidential candidate, Ron DeSantis, said as much on Wednesday evening during the latest and final Republican primary debates.
The question asked of him was regarding election integrity.
As I mentioned, most GOP members don’t like ballot harvesting. Millions of us, in fact, believe that it was election procedures like ballot harvesting and mass mail-in voting that caused so many problems for the 2020 presidential election. They are also the reason millions of us also have a hard time now trusting our entire election process in general.
Naturally, because of this distrust, some states, such as DeSantis’ Florida, have since then put in place more “election integrity” measures, which the GOP candidate talked about briefly on Wednesday. He noted that thanks to many who believe similarly about elections, his state has been able to effectively crack down on voter fraud.
However, he also pointed out that not every state has had Florida’s good sense. “Not every state’s where we need it to be.”
In particular, DeSantis noted there are states like Nevada, which seem to wholeheartedly approve of ballot harvesting. And since he can’t change the voting laws there, it only makes sense to employ the same election tactics the Democrats have and will use.
As DeSantis said, “I’m not going to fight with one hand tied behind my back. If they’re harvesting, we’re harvesting… We are going to exploit whatever the rules are.”
I am not going to fight with one hand tied behind my back.
I'm going to have organizations in all the swing states. If they're harvesting, we're harvesting.
We are going to exploit whatever the rules are. pic.twitter.com/V9ktcSto4D
— Ron DeSantis (@RonDeSantis) December 7, 2023
Basically, DeSantis is fighting fire with fire, especially in swing states where every vote matters.
Again, we might not like the idea, seeing it as a form of cheating. But he’s got a point. 2020 proved to us that we can’t win if we aren’t even playing the same game. And so, for now, our best chance is to go about the election the same way.
Maybe afterward, we can work on changing things.