Trump initially tried to register to vote in Florida with Washington, DC, address: report

Florida elections records show President Trump first tried to register to vote in Florida while claiming Washington, D.C., as his legal residence, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.

The first application, submitted in September, listed the White House as his legal residence despite a Florida law requiring voters to legally reside in the state, the Post reported. The president resubmitted his application with a Florida address the next month and voted by mail in the Sunshine State’s Republican primary in March.

The original application listing the Washington address is dated Sept. 27, the same day the president publicly announced he would change his legal residence from Manhattan to his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Fla. Trump, on two separate forms, listed both the White House as his legal residence and said that he was a “bona fide resident” of Palm Beach.

As recently as 2019, the city manager of Deltona, Fla., agreed to pay more than $5,000 to avoid facing criminal charges after records showed she registered to vote using the address of the Deltona City Hall, according to the Post.

In 1993, a Palm Beach restaurant owner was charged with felony voter fraud for registering in the city but living in neighboring West Palm Beach. The charge was later dropped.

The president has argued since 2018 that he should be allowed to build a dock at the private club, initially saying it was necessary for enhanced security. Later he changed the request to say the club is his “personal residence” and the dock would be “for private family use only.”

However, locals opposed to the dock have pointed to an agreement he signed in the 1990s converting the facility from a single-family residence to a private club, with his attorney at the time saying he would not live at the club.

“It’s one or the other — it’s a club or it’s your home,” Reginald Stambaugh, an attorney who represents a neighbor opposed to Trump’s dock plan, told the Post in an interview last month. “You can’t have it both ways.” Trump has since withdrawn the dock request.

The Hill has reached out to the White House for comment.