Ivanka Trump is making news this morning after saying the reason she and her brother Eric can’t vote for their father in the upcoming New York primary is because of the state’s “onerous” registration rules.
The comments came during a CNN town hall where Anderson Cooper interviewed the entire Trump family. Watch:
Ivanka Trump rips as "onerous" registration laws that will keep her from voting for dad in #NYPrimary. #TrumpFamily https://t.co/E9Tk79uwjC
— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) April 13, 2016
“I’m an independent, and I’ve always voted based on the candidate as opposed to based on the party, and it was actually a very interesting experience,” Ivanka Trump told CNN during Tuesday’s town hall. “So, we’re not a family of politicians. We haven’t been in politics very long.”
“New York has one of the most onerous rules in terms of registration and it required us to register a long time ago, almost close to a year ago,” she added. “And, we didn’t do that.”
“Almost close to a year ago” isn’t entirely accurate.
Donald Trump announced his candidacy on June 16, 2015.
Ivanka and Eric Trump — who were registered as Independents — had until October 9, 2015 to change their registration to Republican to vote in the closed Republican primary. New voters could register in New York up until March 25, 2016.
Ivanka and Eric told Cooper they realized their mistake “about a week later.”
FWIW, this isn’t some new rule change in New York and Bernie Sanders even set up a website to get members of New York’s smaller liberal parties to switch their registrations in time to vote in the Democratic primary. From Gothamist:
Bernie Sanders supporters have made a whole website dedicated to letting slacktivists, coffee-shop socialists, and Green Party members know that for their vote to count in New York, they have to become Democrats. The same applies if you’re a 4chan user who voted Libertarian in 2012 but want Donald Trump to get the Republican nomination so he can continue to troll the world.
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