Trump flips his 2020 stance, launches absentee ballot and early voting push

Former President Trump is urging Republicans to use "every appropriate tool to beat the Democrats," which the presumptive GOP nominee says includes early voting and absentee balloting.

The former president's 2024 campaign and the Republican National Committee (RNC) on Tuesday announced the launch of what they call their "Swamp the Vote USA" effort.

It's a major reversal from Trump's stance four years ago, when he repeatedly condemned early-in-person voting and mail-in balloting and said they were to blame for what he argued was massive election fraud that led to his defeat at the hands of President Biden.

"Republicans must win and we will use every appropriate tool to beat the Democrats because they are destroying our country," Trump argued in his statement.

TRUMP, BIDEN, FACE TESTS IN FINAL 2024 PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARIES

Former President Trump speaks during a campaign event in Wildwood, New Jersey, on May 11. (Hannah Beier/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

And he emphasized that "whether you vote absentee, by mail, early in-person or on election day, we are going to protect the vote. We make sure your ballot is secure and your voice is heard. We must swamp the radical Democrats with massive turnout. The way to win is to swamp them, if we swamp them with votes they can’t cheat. You need to make a plan, register, and vote any way possible. We have got to get your vote." 

Democrats have voted early in greater numbers than Republicans the past couple of election cycles, while Republicans have tended to come out in greater force on Election Day in November.

REPUBLICAN GOVERNORS CHARGE BIDEN HAS ‘DONE NOTHING BUT ATTACK AMERICAN ENERGY’

While Trump has long railed against early voting, the RNC under previous chair Ronna McDaniel a year ago launched an early-voting push known as "Bank the Vote."

The Trump campaign on Tuesday highlighted that "Swamp the Vote USA is the successor to the RNC’s Bank Your Vote program."

People wait to vote outside the Bordeaux Library on the first day of Tennessee's early voting, Oct. 14, 2020, in Nashville, Tennessee. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)

Trump's position on early voting in recent months has been unclear.

At a rally in Michigan three months ago, he told supporters that early voting was "totally corrupt" and "a hoax."

And at an April rally in Pennsylvania, the former president compared early voting to "stealing" the vote. 

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

Last month, at a large rally in New Jersey, Trump said "mail-in voting is largely corrupt."

But at the same event, he urged supporters to "get an absentee or mail-in ballot, vote early or vote on Election Day."

And he's emphasized a couple of times in social media postings that early voting is important.

Former President Trump holds a rally in the historically Democratic South Bronx in New York City on May 23. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

The Biden campaign spotlighted Trump's reversal on early voting.

"Donald Trump told his supporters as recently as February that mail-in voting was ‘totally corrupt’ — last September he proposed eliminating mail-in-voting altogether. Trump has spent years saying early and mail-in voting was ‘fraudulent,’ 'cheating,’ and ‘crooked.’ Apparently his campaign feels otherwise. Trump should own up to the lies about voting and elections he’s been telling for years," campaign spokesperson James Singer told Fox News.

The Trump campaign says the new effort to promote early voting is part of the recently announced Trump Force 47, the campaign and the RNC's neighbor-to-neighbor grassroots organizing program "that focuses on mobilizing highly-targeted voters in critical precincts across the battleground states and districts."

It comes as Trump and the RNC play catch-up with the Biden campaign and the Democratic National Committee when it comes to grassroots outreach and get-out-the-vote efforts, known as GOTV.

While Trump's fundraising has surged in the wake of his conviction last week in the first criminal trial of a current or former president, and while he holds the edge over Biden in the latest polling in the key battleground states that will likely decide their 2024 rematch, Trump and the RNC are facing a deficit when it comes to ground game operations.

The Biden campaign notes that they've hired over 500 staff and opened more than 175 coordinated offices across battleground states. 

And in Pennsylvania, which was one of six states Biden narrowly carried in 2020 to win the White House, the president's re-election campaign, the DNC and the state party have 24 coordinated offices and hundreds of staffers.

TRUMP GUILTY VERDICT IN CRIMINAL TRIAL FIRES UP HIS FUNDRAISING 

The president, a Pennsylvania native, has made numerous official and campaign stops in the state — and Philadelphia in particular — since launching his re-election campaign over a year ago. And last week, Biden and Vice President Harris campaigned in Philadelphia together for the first time.

President Biden and Vice President Harris wave at a campaign event at Girard College in Philadelphia on May 29. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Rep. Welsey Hunt of Texas, a military veteran and Trump surrogate, was in Philadelphia on Tuesday to headline the opening of the former president's first campaign office in Pennsylvania, a crucial Northeastern battleground state.

"The person that's going to come back and save this country from the brink is Donald John Trump," Hunt, a Black Republican and rising star in the GOP, told supporters and reporters packed into a small office in the northeastern corner of the city.

Video

Vince Fenerty, the GOP chair in Philadelphia and a ward leader for over 50 years, told Fox News that "we do need to catch up a little bit, but we are going to open offices all over the state of Pennsylvania."

But Fenerty emphasized that "we have the time to catch up. People are going to jump on the Trump train and the locomotive is going to move fast."

"We did it in this part of the city because it's ethnically diverse, racially diverse, and we want to start here because we want to build a very broad coalition of all Americans to be for President Trump," he noted. 

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

Philadelphia is overwhelmingly blue. Biden carried the city 81%-18% four years ago over Trump.

But Hunt, in an interview with Fox News, highlighted that "we are going bravely where no Republicans in the past 20 to 30 years have gone before. We are not playing catch-up. We are actually fishing where the fish are."

"We know that we are making some very good strides in the Black community, and among Hispanic men and Hispanic women," Hunt added. "So guess what — we are here right now not playing catch-up, but to put the final nail in the coffin."

GOP Rep. Wesley Hunt of Texas headlines the opening of the first Trump campaign office in Pennsylvania in Philadelphia on June 4. (Fox News - Paul Steinhauser)

Kellan White, a senior adviser for the Pennsylvania Democratic coordinated campaign, fired back, telling Fox News that "Donald Trump is a convicted felon who couldn’t find an actual Pennsylvanian to headline his phony event."

And he charged that Trump has "spent years running racist campaigns, implementing a racist agenda, and hurting Black communities every chance he got as president. In stark contrast, Joe Biden is fighting and delivering for Pennsylvanians — especially for Black Pennsylvanians — by capping the cost of insulin at $35 per month for seniors, creating over 500,000 good paying jobs in Pennsylvania alone, and protecting our democracy and reproductive freedoms."

There was grumbling by some Republicans in the Keystone State earlier this spring regarding the lack of any ground game by the Trump campaign and the RNC.

But Lehigh County Republican Committee member Bobby Arena told Fox News on Tuesday that "everything is changing for the better," as he pointed to what he said was "the extra support on the ground and offices that are opening around the state."

Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.