Today In History: Trump Is Against Same-Day Voter Registration; Germany's Surrender Signals End Of WWII

May 8, 2017, is the 128th day of the year, with 237 days remaining. The moon is in a waxing gibbous phase, and illumination is at 95 percent.

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Trump cites “places where people just walk in and vote”

On a Sunday airing of NBC’s “Meet The Press” in 2016, host Chuck Todd asked Donald Trump whether the then-GOP presidential candidate supported policies that make it easier for people to vote.

The answer was no.

“I don’t think people should sneak in through the cracks, and whether that’s an ID or any way you want to do it, but you have to be a citizen to vote,” said Trump.

“Well, of course,” Todd replied. “That is the law as it stands already.”

Trump disagreed, citing “places where people just walk in and vote.” Fact-checking website PolitiFact rated this assertion as false. More specifically, 13 states and Washington, DC have implemented same-day registration provisions as of November 2016. These provisions have safeguards in place to verify voters’ identity.

PolitiFact elaborated on this following Trump’s interview with Todd:

The specifics vary by state because each state makes its own election laws. For example, some, but not all, states have an electronic database that they can use to check a same-day registrant’s eligibility on the spot. Others, like Iowa and New Hampshire, send a mailer to all same-day registrants, and if the card is returned as undeliverable, the state will investigate the case as potential election fraud.

Germany surrenders, signaling end of World War II

Seated before a flurry of camera flashes in 1945, a microphone stationed atop his desk, President Harry Truman announced the surrender of Germany in what would ultimately lead to the official end of World War II that following September. The president called the occasion a “solemn [but] glorious hour.”

“The western world has been freed of the evil forces which for five years and longer have imprisoned the bodies and broken the lives of millions upon millions of free-born men,” said Truman.

“They have violated their churches, destroyed their homes, corrupted their children and murdered their loved ones. Our Armies of Liberation have restored freedom to these suffering people, whose spirit and will the oppressors could never enslave.”

A full transcript of Truman’s speech has been archived on the Harry S. Truman Library & Museum website.

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