Trump suggests postponing the 2020 US election. When will it be?

On Thursday (July 30), U.S. President Trump posted on social media Twitter, suggesting that the date of the 2020 general election be postponed. Although Trump's idea of ​​postponing the 2020 U.S. presidential election was just a "proposal" with three question marks, it still attracted the attention of many international media. The BBC, the New York Times, the Associated Press and others pushed the news as soon as possible.

In addition, major mainstream American media such as CNBC, CNN, and the Washington Post have all reported on the matter and all agree that: the president does not have the right to postpone the general election, only Congress does!

The Hill believes that this tweet marks the first time Trump has proposed the idea of ​​postponing the November election. Trump has attacked the expansion of mail-in voting in recent weeks, but more states are embracing the practice as an alternative to in-person voting during the coronavirus pandemic, the report said.

CNBC reported that Trump does not have the power to unilaterally postpone the election, which is scheduled to be held on the first Tuesday in November under a 19th-century law passed by Congress.

Attorney General Bill Barr was asked during a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday whether a sitting president could change the date of an election. "I haven't looked at that question under the Constitution," Barr said. While states have the power to postpone their primaries, only Congress can change the date of the presidential election because the Constitution gives Congress the power to set the date for the general election.
The Washington Post reports that the U.S. Congress decides the date of the presidential election. If an emergency arises, the president cannot bypass Congress and postpone or cancel the election.

If Trump really wants to change the election date, he needs to lobby Congress. It would take a vote from both houses of Congress to change the election date. Even if Trump receives the support of the Democrats, the House of Representatives is still controlled by the Democrats, and they are unlikely to take action to postpone the election as Trump requests.

If he can't change the election date, Trump can still change how the election is conducted. The law states that if the epidemic still affects election voting in the fall, Trump can exercise emergency powers to prevent voters in urban areas with severe epidemics from going to polling stations in person in the name of public health. That would depress turnout in densely populated urban areas, which tend to vote for Democratic candidates.

Democrats and some Republicans are pushing for mail voting, but Trump and some Republicans around him are trying to stop it.

After the news broke that Trump suggested postponing the 2020 US election, the dollar's decline intensified, falling to a low of 93.20, a new low since June 2018; non-US currencies such as the euro and pound rebounded, recovering their previous losses, with the euro reaching a high of 1.1809; the pound hit a high of 1.3062.

In addition, spot gold recovered most of its previous losses and returned to around the 1,960 mark. It had earlier fallen to a low of $1,944.80 an ounce, rebounding as much as $15 from its intraday low.