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 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.

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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.

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While Trump has long railed against early voting, the Republican National Committee 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."

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. 

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.

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 DNC 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.

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