When Independent does not mean independent

From the Independent -

Supreme Court lets Trump implement major mail-in voting restrictions

The Supreme Court will let Donald Trump implement a sweeping executive order for new mail-in voting rules that could significantly restrict voters’ access to ballots in high-stakes midterm elections this fall, but the legal battle is far from over.

Federal courts have repeatedly blocked the U.S. Postal Service from further implementing Trump’s executive order that sought to create a national voter registration list that would be used to decide who is eligible to cast a ballot.

The casual reader might not suspect that this debate is about the rather obvious potential for postal voting to be used for electoral fraud. 

The possibilities are obvious in the UK and even from this side of the Atlantic they are even more obvious in the US. Something to guard against with procedural rigour we might think, but the Independent takes about 800 words to get even this far -

Trump — who has spent years baselessly insisting that voting by mail is ripe for fraud, and that manipulated ballots were “rigged” against him in elections he lost — is simultaneously demanding the Senate pass his SAVE America Act, which would also restrict mail-in voting and require ID to vote, among other changes.


And to finish we have this -


The Independent stands for many things, often uniquely so. It stands independent of political party allegiance, and makes its own mind up on the issues of the day. The Independent has always been committed to challenge and debate. It launched in 1986 to create a new voice and in that time has run campaigns for issues ranging from the legalisation of marijuana to the Final Say Brexit petition.