| “For a campaign that frequently equates boats with voter enthusiasm, it speaks volumes that Donald Trump’s own campaign manager couldn’t be bothered to pull the lever for his own candidate in 2016,” said Kyle Morse, an American Bridge 21st Century spokesperson. “Who could’ve known that the hundreds of thousands of dollars the Trump campaign has spent on DC television ads was not to soothe Trump’s ego but to convince their own campaign staff to vote for their boss. We hope Bill Stepien will once again join the majority of Americans in not supporting Trump on Election Day.” |
| ICYMI: Washington Post: Trump campaign manager didn’t vote for his boss in 2016. He didn’t vote at all. By Colby Itkowitz on 9/18/20 President Trump’s campaign manager didn’t vote for his boss in the last presidential election. He didn’t vote at all. The last time Bill Stepien voted, according to public records, was 2015 when he lived in New Jersey and was registered there. Stepien registered to vote in Washington, D.C., where he’s been living since 2017, at the end of July — two weeks after he was tapped to take over Trump’s reelection bid. Stepien, a onetime aide to former New Jersey governor Chris Christie (R) first joined Trump’s team in August 2016. A senior campaign official said Stepien requested an absentee ballot that never arrived, so he didn’t vote in 2016. He wasn’t registered in either New Jersey or Washington to vote in the 2018 midterm elections. Neither Stepien nor a campaign spokesman responded to further questions about his voting record, including whether he made additional efforts to obtain a ballot or considered voting in-person to support Trump. Trump, who voted by absentee ballot in Florida this year, has repeatedly attacked voting by mail, claiming without evidence that it is susceptible to widespread fraud and corruption. The president has encouraged people to vote in person amid the coronavirus pandemic to ensure their vote is counted, even suggesting they try to vote once by mail and once at their polling place, which is illegal. Despite Trump’s antagonism against widespread voting by mail, at least 16 top Trump officials regularly vote that way, including Vice President Pence, Attorney General William P. Barr and White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany.Stepien, however, appears to be the first high-level aide not to have voted in the 2016 GOP primary or presidential election when Trump was on the ballot. Stepien, who was fired by Christie in 2014 amid the Bridgegate scandal, joined Trump’s campaign in its final months to oversee field operations and help strategize which states to target. New Jersey, where Stepien would have voted in 2016, was not one of them as it reliably votes Democratic in presidential elections. Read more here. |
Published: Sep 18, 2020