Washington
CNN
—
Former President Donald Trump has escalated his long-running assault on the integrity of US elections because the 2024 presidential marketing campaign enters its last stretch, utilizing a brand new collection of lies about ballots, vote-counting and the election course of to put the groundwork to problem a possible defeat in November.
Nonpartisan democracy consultants say they’re seeing lots of the similar warning indicators that have been blinking red before Election Day 4 years in the past, when Trump flooded the zone with election lies and conspiracy theories that he amplified after shedding to Joe Biden. His marketing campaign of deception culminated within the assault on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.
“The threats haven’t abated; they’ve solely elevated,” stated Lindsay Daniels, a senior director on the nonpartisan Democracy Fund, which works to strengthen US democracy. “We noticed lots of exercise in 2020 round peddling false claims and frivolous lawsuits. We’re already seeing indicators now, stage-setting, that these items could also be tried once more.”
Trump has made no less than 12 distinct false claims during the last two months that elevate baseless doubts concerning the validity of a possible victory by Vice President Kamala Harris. (Latest polls suggest the race is very close, and Trump might actually nonetheless win.)
Trump, who wrongly insists the 2020 election was marred by huge fraud, said at a debate in June that he’ll settle for the 2024 outcomes no matter who wins “if it’s a good and authorized and good election.” A majority of Trump supporters in battleground states like Michigan, Arizona, and Pennsylvania now say they’re “by no means assured” or solely “simply just a little” assured the outcomes might be precisely tallied, in keeping with recent CNN polling.
Trump has lied concerning the legitimacy of the vote counts in key states, the reliability of mail-in and abroad ballots, the dimensions of Harris’ crowds at rallies, and extra. Right here’s a truth verify of those and different claims.
False declare: Harris can solely win by way of dishonest
For months, beginning lengthy earlier than any votes have been solid within the 2024 common election, Trump repeatedly claimed that he already has sufficient votes to win and easily wants to make sure Democrats don’t cheat — insinuating that the one approach he might probably lose is thru fraud.
Trump said at an August rally in Arizona: “The one approach they will do something is that if they cheat like hell, and we’ve been victims of that. … We don’t want the votes, we simply need to guarantee that they don’t cheat.” He said at an August rally in North Carolina: “Our major focus is to not get out the vote, it’s to verify they don’t cheat, as a result of we’ve all of the votes you want.”
And in a Friday speech in Michigan, he said, “If I lose – I’ll inform you what, it’s doable. As a result of they cheat. That’s the one approach we’re gonna lose, as a result of they cheat.”
Information First: That is nonsense. It’s clearly solely doable that Harris might legitimately win the presidential election. Whereas it’s additionally solely doable that Trump wins legitimately, he couldn’t probably know for certain on the time of those feedback that he already had “all of the votes you want.”
False declare: It was ‘unconstitutional’ for the Democrats to interchange Biden with Harris
Trump has repeatedly claimed the equity of the 2024 election was tarnished as a result of Biden dropped out of the race in July and Harris subsequently grew to become the Democratic presidential nominee. In August, he called Harris’ ascension “an unconstitutional coup” and claimed Biden’s “Presidency was Unconstitutionally STOLEN from him” by Harris.
Information First: Trump’s claims are false. There was nothing unconstitutional or unlawful about Biden dropping out and Harris then being chosen by Democratic delegates because the social gathering’s presidential nominee.
Biden give up the race earlier than he had grow to be the official Democratic nominee — the social gathering makes the official nomination at its conference, which hadn’t occurred but. Meaning Biden dropped out earlier than his title was positioned on any state ballots.
CNN spoke in July with election authorities in 48 states, and never a single state authority, Republican or Democratic, stated there have been any authorized points with Harris getting on the final election poll instead of Biden after she was formally nominated in August. She didn’t find yourself going through obstacles getting on the poll in any state.
And whereas Biden actually confronted heavy Democratic stress to depart the race after his poor efficiency in a debate towards Trump in June, the choice to drop out was his alone; he might have stored operating if he had chosen to take action. In different phrases, the candidate swap was the product of politics, not a forcible takeover.
False declare: Voting by non-citizens is a widespread drawback in US elections
Trump and his allies have repeatedly raised concerns that the 2024 election might be tarnished by widespread voting by non-citizens and undocumented immigrants.
Republicans put this concern entrance and heart in April, when Trump and Home Speaker Mike Johnson unveiled laws to require all voters throughout the nation to show their citizenship. Efforts to go the invoice fizzled earlier in September amid disunity throughout the Republican caucus.
Additional fanning the flames, billionaire Trump supporter Elon Musk has championed the conspiracy idea that Democrats are “importing voters” to allow them to create a “one-party state.” On the presidential debate earlier this month, Trump equally accused Harris and Democrats of plotting to tip the election with unlawful voters.
“Our elections are dangerous, and lots of these unlawful immigrants coming in, they’re attempting to get them to vote,” Trump stated. “They will’t even converse English. They don’t even know what nation they’re in virtually. And these individuals are attempting to get them to vote.”
Information First: This particular Trump declare is fake, and it’s additionally usually unfaithful to say that voting by non-citizens is a widespread drawback plaguing US elections. There’s merely no proof to again up that declare; it’s already unlawful for non-citizens to vote in federal elections, and the assorted safeguards already in place are working successfully to cease it from taking place en masse.
Each liberal and conservative suppose tanks have discovered solely a tiny variety of examples of non-citizens voting in elections the place they’re ineligible. The suitable-wing Heritage Basis’s database of confirmed fraud circumstances lists lower than 100 examples of non-citizens voting between 2002 and 2022, amid multiple billion lawfully solid ballots.
Additional, nonpartisan consultants on election regulation say such circumstances are nearly all the time caught, because of layers of identification verification constructed into the registration and voting course of.
Right here is CNN’s previous fact-check debunking false claims about non-citizens voting extensively in federal elections. And right here is CNN’s breakdown of the underlying knowledge in key states, displaying how Republicans have massively inflated the dimensions of this drawback.
Trump has an extended historical past of blaming electoral losses on undocumented immigrants. When he gained the presidency in 2016, he misplaced the favored vote by almost 3 million — and to clarify this away, he concocted the lie that “thousands and thousands” of non-citizens had voted illegally.
False declare: The US Postal Service admitted it’s ‘a poorly run mess’
In a social media post in mid-September, Trump claimed that the US Postal Service “admitted that it’s a poorly run mess that’s experiencing mail loss and delays at a stage by no means seen earlier than” and requested “how can we probably be anticipated to permit or belief the U.S. Postal Service to run the 2024 Presidential Election?”
Information First: Trump’s declare is fake. There’s no proof of the USPS ever admitting that it’s a “poorly run mess.” Reacting to Trump’s feedback at a September 19 press conference, Postmaster Common Louis DeJoy stated, “My response is like my response to everybody who says we’re not ready for the election — it’s that they’re flawed.”
DeJoy grew to become postmaster general in June 2020 after being chosen by the bipartisan USPS Board of Governors, whose members have been all appointed by Trump. DeJoy has touted the truth that in 2020, USPS delivered 99% of all mail ballots inside one week.
The Nationwide Affiliation of Secretaries of State, an umbrella group that represents election officers from each events, began elevating alarm bells earlier this month with a sharply worded letter to DeJoy expressing “ongoing issues” concerning the postal service’s “capacity to ship election mail in a well timed and correct method.”
In response, DeJoy stated the USPS was endeavor “extraordinary measures” to verify all mail ballots are delivered on time, together with designated traces at put up workplaces for folks with ballots, additional deliveries and collections by letter-carriers, “after-hours” drop-offs to election workplaces, and protecting processing services open longer.
Requested by CNN for proof of the supposed USPS admission that it was a “poorly run mess,” a Trump marketing campaign spokeswoman responded with two information articles that weren’t proof.
The articles have been concerning the latest letter that the election officers despatched to DeJoy — which didn’t originate from USPS and wasn’t an admission of something.
Trump has continued elevating unfounded doubts about mail-in voting, predicting in a latest interview with a right-wing radio host that USPS “will lose lots of of hundreds of ballots, possibly purposely.”
There is no such thing as a proof of the USPS ever shedding ballots on this scale, although remoted mishaps have occurred and been remedied in previous election cycles. Moreover, most mail-in ballots are trackable lately, with monitoring instruments provided in nearly each state.
False declare: There is no such thing as a identification verification for abroad and navy voters
Trump rolled out a brand new lie in late September about navy and abroad voting.
For this tiny slice of the nationwide citizens, voters can obtain and submit ballots over e mail, as a result of they’re civilians who reside overseas or servicemembers which are stationed abroad.
These are sometimes referred to as “UOCAVA voters,” from the acronym for the federal regulation that arrange this technique: the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, which handed with bipartisan backing and was signed by Republican President Ronald Reagan in 1986.
The deadline for states to ship out UOCAVA ballots was September 21. In a social media put up two days later, Trump baselessly accused Democrats of utilizing this program “to CHEAT” within the election. “They will use UOCAVA to get ballots, a program that emails ballots abroad with none citizenship verify or verification of identification, in any respect,” Trump claimed.
Information First: It’s not true that UOCAVA ballots are despatched to folks with no verification “in any respect” of their identification. These particular ballots are solely despatched to registered voters who request them, and states require folks to confirm their identification when registering.
David Becker, founder and government director of the nonpartisan Heart for Election Innovation & Analysis, who recurrently advises state and native election officers from each events, blasted Trump on social media for “actively spreading false details about a bipartisan program.”
“Navy and abroad ballots have gone out to registered, verified voters (as required by regulation) and they’re safe,” Becker wrote the day after Trump’s declare. “I can inform you election officers of each events take nice pleasure in giving navy and abroad voters a safe voice in our election, and it’s unlucky to see a candidate unfold lies about that course of.”
Democrats Overseas, an arm of the Democratic Get together, condemned Trump’s “absurd rant” in an announcement to CNN, and stated UOCAVA ballots “are solely despatched to folks whose registration have been confirmed and validated by their native elections workplace.”
False declare: Harris spied on Trump’s marketing campaign
Trump launched a brand new assault on Harris after information broke over the summer time that Iranian hackers breached some Trump marketing campaign e mail accounts and despatched a few of the stolen supplies to journalists and Democratic marketing campaign operatives.
“THE FBI CAUGHT IRAN SPYING ON MY CAMPAIGN, AND GIVING ALL OF THE INFORMATION TO THE KAMALA HARRIS CAMPAIGN. THEREFORE SHE AND HER CAMPAIGN WERE ILLEGALLY SPYING ON ME,” Trump posted on Fact Social in mid-September.
Information First: Trump’s declare that the Harris marketing campaign spied on him is baseless. Iran did breach the Trump marketing campaign, however there’s no proof anybody from the Harris marketing campaign was concerned within the breach, solicited hacked supplies, or weaponized these supplies in any approach. The Harris marketing campaign condemned Iran’s “unwelcome and unacceptable” election interference.
The federal authorities announced in August that Iranian hackers efficiently focused the Trump marketing campaign, and that in addition they tried to breach the Biden-Harris campaigns.
US intelligence businesses later disclosed that the Iranian hackers despatched unsolicited messages containing a few of stolen Trump supplies to some folks related to the Biden marketing campaign. This included “a number of people” who’re at the moment concerned with Harris’ marketing campaign, her workforce told CNN.
Regardless of Trump’s claims, there isn’t a proof the Iranian hackers offered the Harris marketing campaign with “all the info” they stole. The US spy businesses stated “an excerpt” of some stolen materials was offered. Extra importantly, the US spy businesses stated “there may be at the moment no info indicating these recipients replied” to the hackers.
The Harris marketing campaign’s condemnation of Iran and refusal to make use of the stolen materials is a stark distinction to how Trump embraced Russia’s hack-and-leak towards his Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton throughout the 2016 marketing campaign. Even after the US announced that the leaks have been a part of a Kremlin plot to intervene with the US election, Trump and his marketing campaign built a strategy to capitalize off Russia’s unlawful actions and used the emails to attack Clinton on a near-daily basis.
False declare: California’s vote counts are dishonest
Trump has wrongly claimed for years that US vote counts are suffering from main fraud. Within the final month, he has even declared that he would win Democratic-dominated California if there was an “sincere” vote depend. (California’s giant inhabitants implies that a candidate’s vote totals there have a big affect on the nationwide in style vote — which Trump has baselessly solid doubt on for years, even when he won the presidency in 2016.)
Trump said in September that “if I ran with an sincere vote counter in California I might win California, however the votes aren’t counted truthfully.” In late August, he said, “If Jesus got here down and was the vote counter, I might win California, okay?”
Information First: That is fiction. The votes are counted truthfully in California, as they’re in each different state. Trump loses California as a result of it’s an overwhelmingly Democratic state that no Republican presidential candidate has carried since 1988.
Trump misplaced the state in 2020, honest and sq., by more 5 million votes and more than 29 percentage points. It’s ridiculous to recommend that fraudulent vote-counting was accountable for a margin that enormous.
Like a number of different states, California conducts post-election audits to confirm the accuracy of the vote depend. These audits use mathematical fashions and statistics to access the accuracy of the general tally primarily based on random samples of ballots.
False declare: Election officers use early voting to commit fraud
Trump has encouraged his supporters this 12 months to utilize early voting. However at a rally in Pennsylvania final week, he suggested that the lag time between when an early poll is solid and Election Day is utilized by nefarious actors to fraudulently manipulate the depend.
“Now we’ve this silly stuff the place you possibly can vote 45 days early. I’m wondering what the hell occurs throughout that 45 — ‘Let’s transfer the … see these votes, we’ve obtained about one million votes in there, let’s transfer them, we’re fixing the air conditioner within the room,’ proper? No, it’s horrible. What occurred the final time was disgraceful, together with proper right here. However we’re not going to let it occur once more,” Trump stated.
Information First: That is one other phony narrative. There is no such thing as a indication that there was any counting fraud involving early ballots in 2020, in Pennsylvania or anyplace else. Early ballots are securely saved in election workplaces till they’re counted. Individuals who intervene with ballots throughout this era are topic to prosecution.
False declare: Trump gained Minnesota in 2020
Trump declared in March and May that he gained Minnesota within the 2020 election.
At a Minnesota rally in July, he claimed, “In the event that they don’t cheat, we win this state simply, Okay? They cheat.” He added, “They’re probably the most crooked. They cheat. They cheated within the final election, they usually’re going to cheat on this election, however we’re going to get them.”
Information First: Trump’s claims are false.
He misplaced Minnesota by greater than 7 share factors within the 2020 election, honest and sq., and he can actually lose the state legitimately in 2024.
The state hasn’t chosen a Republican for president since 1972, and Trump has persistently trailed in opinion polls towards Harris — whose operating mate is the sitting Minnesota governor, Tim Walz.
False declare: A big share of mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania are fraudulent
Pennsylvania is without doubt one of the most necessary swing states within the 2024 election. Trump claimed in a social media put up in September that an “election professional” interviewed by right-wing commentator Tucker Carlson had urged a big share of mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania are fraudulent.
“An interview by Tucker Carlson of an election professional signifies that 20% of the Mail-In Ballots in Pennsylvania are fraudulent. Right here we go once more! The place is the U.S. Lawyer Common and FBI to INVESTIGATE? The place is the Pennsylvania Republican Get together? We are going to WIN Pennsylvania by loads, except the Dems are allowed to CHEAT,” he wrote.
Information First: There is no such thing as a legitimate foundation for the declare that 20% of mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania — or another state — are fraudulent. This declare seems to be primarily based on a flawed 2023 ballot by a right-wing pollster, not the invention of any precise issues with ballots in Pennsylvania or anyplace else from 2020, 2022 or this 12 months.
The 2020 election was honest and safe in Pennsylvania, because it was in the remainder of the nation, in keeping with officers from each events who affirmed the outcomes. There was a tiny smattering of voter fraud within the state in 2020 —– a few of it committed by Trump supporters — however not even near sufficient to have affected the result.
Pennsylvania’s Division of State stated in a September e mail to CNN: “Voting by mail is secure and safe, and no proof exists of widespread mail voting fraud in Pennsylvania.
Mail poll fraud has been confirmed to be exceptionally uncommon. Claims of systemic voter fraud are devoid of any supporting proof and have persistently been rejected by judges, authorities businesses, and election consultants throughout the political spectrum.”
So what was Trump referring to?
Trump and his marketing campaign didn’t specify what interview he was speaking about. However in April, Carlson interviewed somebody who spoke of a 2023 poll performed by a right-wing agency, Rasmussen Studies, that has itself promoted false election claims. Amongst doubtless voters in that ballot who stated they’d been absentee or mail-in voters in 2020, 21% claimed to have crammed out a poll for a pal or member of the family and 17% claimed they’d voted in a state the place they have been not a everlasting resident.
There are many causes to not deal with this ballot as proof of mass fraud in Pennsylvania.
First, this was a nationwide ballot, not a Pennsylvania ballot. Second, the pollster is viewed skeptically by many polling consultants. Third, folks making claims to a pollster about their previous habits does not prove that they really did what they stated.
Fourth, as FactCheck.org pointed out earlier this month, it’s authorized to fill out a poll for a voter with disabilities who has requested for the help — so somebody saying they crammed out another person’s poll isn’t essentially a confession of fraud. Fifth, as FactCheck.org additionally famous, the wording of the residency query was ambiguous sufficient that folks might have thought it was asking about authorized habits — comparable to having voted in 2020 in a distinct state from the one they at the moment lived in three years later.
False declare: Harris fabricated a picture to inflate her crowd dimension
Since 2020, varied Trump supporters have claimed that Biden’s unimpressive crowd sizes are proof that Biden’s 2020 vote complete, about 81 million, was fraudulently inflated. (Trump earned about 74 million votes in 2020.)
In August, Trump launched an assault on Harris’ crowd sizes. He claimed on social media that Harris needs to be disqualified from the race as a result of, he claimed, she had faked a picture of a big crowd at her rally at a Michigan airport. He wrote: “There was no one on the airplane, and she or he ‘A.I.’d’ it, and confirmed an enormous ‘crowd’ of so-called followers, BUT THEY DIDN’T EXIST!”
He additionally wrote, “That is the best way the Democrats win Elections, by CHEATING – And so they’re even worse on the Poll Field. She needs to be disqualified as a result of the creation of a faux picture is ELECTION INTERFERENCE. Anybody who does that may cheat at ANYTHING!”
Information First: Trump’s claims are false. Harris didn’t create a faux picture of the Michigan crowd utilizing synthetic intelligence or the rest. As real images and movies confirmed, and reporters on scene confirmed, she had an actual crowd of hundreds of individuals on the airport occasion.
The false declare that the Harris marketing campaign was pushing faux pictures of this Michigan crowd had been circulated by some far-right influencers earlier than Trump adopted it.
Asked by CNN in August why he made the false declare, Trump stated he “can’t say what was there, who was there” and will solely talk about his personal giant crowds. However he made one other false declare about Harris’ crowds on the presidential debate towards Harris in September, wrongly saying, “Individuals don’t go to her rallies.”
False declare: Biden or Harris orchestrated Trump’s authorized circumstances
Trump has repeatedly claimed this 12 months that “all” of the authorized circumstances towards him, together with native and state circumstances, have been all orchestrated by Biden for the aim of “election interference,” to assist Democrats win the election.
In July, when Biden dropped out of the race and Harris grew to become the Democratic candidate, Trump began claiming she was the one behind the circumstances.
Information First: These claims are false. There is no such thing as a proof that Biden personally orchestrated any of those circumstances. Trump by no means introduced any proof for that declare, not to mention for instantly making the vice chairman the goal of the declare after months of directing it on the president.
There is no such thing as a signal that both Biden or Harris had any position in bringing prices towards Trump in Manhattan, New York (the place Trump was convicted of 34 felony counts of falsifying enterprise data) or Fulton County, Georgia (the place an election subversion case towards Trump is on hold over a battle about whether or not the district lawyer needs to be disqualified). These prosecutions have been led by elected native prosecutors, each Democrats, who don’t even report back to the federal authorities.
Trump’s two federal prison circumstances, one about election subversion and one about Trump’s retention of categorized paperwork after his presidency, have been introduced by a particular counsel, Jack Smith. A decide dismissed the categorized paperwork case in July, however Smith is appealing.
Smith was appointed by Lawyer Common Merrick Garland, a Biden appointee, however that’s removed from proof that Biden orchestrated the prosecutions – and definitely not proof that Harris did. Garland has said he would resign if Biden ever requested him to take motion towards Trump, however expressed confidence that Biden would by no means put him in that place.