The president wants Congress to ban most mail-in voting. But his wife and son, Barron, also voted by mail in Tuesday’s special election, as did Mr. Trump.
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WASHINGTON – Like President Donald Trump himself, first lady Melania Trump and her son Barron just voted by mail in the March 24 special election in Palm Beach, Florida, despite President Trump’s years of attacking mail-in voting as “mail fraud” that is susceptible to fraud.
Melania Trump requested a mail-in ballot on the same day as her husband, Saturday, March 14, according to the Palm Beach County Elections Director’s website. She listed her home address as 1100 South Ocean Boulevard in Palm Beach, which is Trump’s Mar-a-Lago mansion and private club.
Barron, who just turned 20 on March 20, also listed Mar-a-Lago as his address and requested a mail-in ballot on March 14, according to voter records. The site shows that votes were cast for both candidates, but does not say when.
The polling location, the Morton & Barbara Mandel Recreation Center at 340 Seaview Avenue in Palm Beach, is a 6.3-mile drive from Mar-a-Lago, or about 13 minutes without traffic.
Barron Trump is the president’s only child with his third wife and is President Trump’s youngest child. He graduated from Oxbridge Academy in suburban West Palm Beach in May 2024 and is currently a student at New York University’s Stern School of Business.
The White House had no immediate comment on the fact that the two voted by mail with the president, even though Trump vehemently opposed the practice in all cases except for illness, disability, military service, and travel.
“As President Trump has stated, the SAVE America Act provides common-sense exceptions for Americans to vote by mail due to illness, disability, military, or travel, but universal mail-in voting carries too high a risk of fraud and should not be allowed,” White House press secretary Olivia Wales said in a March 24 statement to USA TODAY.
The White House did not respond to several requests for comment on March 24 about which exceptions to the proposed SAVE Act President Trump is using for mail-in voting.
Early voting for the two state House seats continued until March 22, when the president was still staying at his Mar-a-Lago mansion in Palm Beach.
The president had endorsed John Maples over Democrat Emily Gregory in the 87th Congressional District in Palm Beach County, Florida. But Maples and Brian Nathan, another Republican running for the Florida Senate, lost to Democrats in the latest sign that Democrats are doing well in traditional Republican strongholds.
Neither First Lady Melania Trump nor Barron Trump have spoken publicly about voting by mail. But the president has vocally attacked it for years, raising questions about the hypocrisy of voting by mail even as the SAVE America Act seeks to prevent most others from voting by mail.
Days before the Florida special election, President Trump ramped up his attacks on mail-in voting, calling it a way for Democrats to try to steal the election.
“Voting by mail means mail fraud. I call it mail fraud, and we have to do something about all of this,” President Trump said at a roundtable on crime in Memphis on March 23.
He also wants the Supreme Court to uphold a Republican effort to block states from counting late-arriving mail-in ballots, a decision that would lead to stricter voting rules across the country.
President Trump had ‘ample opportunity to vote in person’
Florida law allows for no-excuse mail-in voting, allowing any registered voter to request and submit a ballot by mail. Trump has voted absentee and by mail multiple times in recent elections, including while living in Florida after leaving the White House.
But Trump on Thursday night on Truth Social urged South Floridians to get out and vote in person, including a link to find their local polling place.
“While he had ample opportunity to conveniently vote in person during Florida’s early voting period, he chose to vote by mail instead, just as tens of millions of other Americans do every election cycle,” David Becker, executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research, told USA TODAY.
Becker said the version of the SAVE Act that was being considered in Congress as of last month would have required a copy of an ID with the mail-in ballot. “That would make voting by mail very difficult for everyone,” including college students like Barron Trump, who live in one place and vote in another, he told USA TODAY in a text message.
The SAVE Act, officially known as the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility Act, is a huge priority for President Trump, who has vowed to stop signing virtually all legislation until Congress passes it.
Republican efforts to pass it face stiff opposition from Democrats. Additionally, while Republicans, who hold majorities in both houses of Congress, generally support the bill, many members are reluctant to eliminate the Senate filibuster and the de facto majority requirement for passing legislation, as President Trump has called for.
At an event on March 23, President Trump appealed to the lawmakers considering the bill to pass it as soon as possible. “I urge Republican senators to do so immediately,” Trump said. “Don’t worry about Easter, let’s go home. In fact, make this for Jesus, okay?”
Despite pressure from President Trump, the bill has a good chance of passing in the narrow Senate.
