Don’t panic. This is just another attempt to distract from the Epstein files (which are now nearly a year beyond the date set by Congress for full release.)
From Mock Paper Scissors:
The Orange 
told Reuters that he’s doing such a good job that “when you think of it, we shouldn’t even have an election.”
Semi-sentient jar of Mayonnaise Karoline Leavitt soon walked it back, insisting he was “simply joking.”
Hair Füror is such a kidder, he enjoys a good laugh at his own expense, amirite?
Anyway, yesterday when we talking about it, I only mentioned how cancelling the elections would cause the government to stop functioning, but I left out all the reasons why Hair Füror cannot cancel the elections,I probably should not have been so fast.
(But we’ve talked about it many times, too).
That said, Taegan Goddard has enumerated the many reasons in his email thingie to paid subscribers, and breaking protocol, here’s what he said:
The president has no authority to cancel elections. Federal elections are governed by the Constitution and federal law, but they are administered by the states. There is no executive order, emergency declaration, or legal loophole that allows a president to simply call them off.
Elections are decentralized by design. The United States doesn’t have a single national election authority. Elections are run by 50 states and thousands of local jurisdictions. Secretaries of state, county clerks, and local election boards do not report to the White House — and they can’t be ordered to “stand down.”
Congress can’t be forced to cooperate. Even if Trump wanted to nullify elections in practice, there is no mechanism to compel Republican members of Congress to resign, suspend terms, or support canceling elections.
The logistics make it unworkable. Elections involve tens of thousands of polling places, millions of ballots, and armies of local workers and volunteers. There is no realistic way for a president to shut down that infrastructure nationwide.
That’s why off-year elections, special elections, and local contests continue to move forward regardless of what Trump says. The system is intentionally fragmented to prevent exactly this kind of abuse.
Trump can complain about elections. He can delegitimize them rhetorically. He can try to undermine trust in the results.
But actually stopping them? That’s a very different thing.
I’m just not worried about that; I know I’m always warning people to not confuse actual scandals with distractions, but this was a distraction.
