Why is election denial still a MAGA mantra? It is about after Nov. 3

Why is election denial still a MAGA mantra? It is about after Nov. 3 . That is also when the real danger to democracy and the battle to save it begins.  The puzzle is why MAGA keeps on lighting their own smoke bombs, contending the 2020 election was stolen, yet they lose every attempt to prove there is fire?  Recently, they lost again in Colorado as a judge ruled  Trump could not get the state voter rolls.   In Nevada, after the feds claimed, using their own workaround list, just approved by the Supreme Court, that over a thousand who voted were not citizens, they found they were wrong in every instance. Those they claimed were non-citizens voting turned out to be 0. Such has been the outcome for the past six years. Instances of voter fraud were rare and never enough to change the outcome of an election, per both the Cato Institute and the Heritage Foundation.,  Trump's big lie has never been proved in any court or by any study, even by his own controlled DOJ, which found that fraud and non-citizen voting were extremely rare.   Why do Trump and his MAGA loyalists keep beating their heads against this stone wall? (Polls show in 2026 about 63% of Republicans believe the 2020 election was stolen.)

 Only the 6 justices on the Supreme Court give Trump the benefit of the doubt whenever they could have taken the Trump regime's attempt to control voter outcomes down. (The exception was for now: do not use the post office to police who can vote by mail.) Their recent 6-3 ruling approving the federal attempt to come up with faulty lists of suspected non-citizens voting by validating the SAVE Act is instructive. Whose neck the SAVE Act could help save from an unfavorable vote is DJT's.   

  One would think  Trump would stop trying to justify his "stop the steal" claims, since his regime's claims keep being debunked.  It has served his purposes well to justify and give a pretext to his cruel mass deportations via ICE and his attempt to defy the Constitution or laws to federalize elections and put their control in his hands.  Those who have animus or fears about those unlike themselves and find this a useful, politically correct outlet to express it is a possibility. But that is only a theory that is difficult to measure by polls.

Another explanation that makes sense is that Trump and MAGA  are attempting to lay a propaganda pretext to challenge the results of the Nov. 4 midterms they do not like. The scheme could also be a Hail Mary to throw the election results into chaos, and to give some rationale to seize ballots, declare martial law, or call out paramilitary, ICE, active-duty, and National Guard military should angered citizens take to the streets. No doubt Trump wants to keep control of the House and maybe the Senate or, heaven forbid, get a third term, even if he loses elections. 

Is this implausible? He might not succeed, but he just might try. His egomania is out of control. There is no one around him to just say no and stop him. He is not delusional about his powers.  He controls the levers of power through his loyal appointees, including both Justice's DOJ and the Department of Defense. His cabinet members would never invoke the 25th Amendment, Section 4.. His current Congress is composed of a majority of betas bowing down to the alpha male in charge.  Also at his command is a well-armed militia called ICE and even if the active military does not follow Pete Hegseth's orders to shoot demonstrators or to capture the Capitol, using the pretext lie that the reason Trump lost the House and Senate was that so many "illegals" voted, ICE is standing by.  How will we know he has unleashed a violent coup again?  If he invokes some bogus national emergency and invokes the Insurrection Act. 

 What are the chances the active military would not follow Hegseth's orders? Hegseth has embarked on a historic purge to replace the command brass with loyalists. He has also announced that he is reducing the brass in the Pentagon by 20%.  For what purpose? 

We shouldn't put it past him. Trump is so fixated on becoming a dictator like those he admires, such as Putin and Xi, that we should not take it for granted he would not dare to stage such a coup. It is a trick many wannabe dictators have used successfully to trade democracy for rule by one or a small group. Trump "lit the fire",in the January 6 failed attempt, and he learned much, so he must think he knows how he will not fail again.

While the public is focused on the Nov. 3 midterms,  the real show with democracy at risk  is likely to begin Nov. 4.  

https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/trump-doj-now-0-for-20-after-judge-dismisses-colorado-voter-roll-lawsuit-with-prejudice

/https://www.democracydocket.com/news-alerts/dhs-noncitizen-voter-claims-unravel-in-nevada-as-state-confirms-flagged-voters-are-citizens

https://www.cato.org/commentary/rights-bogus-claims-about-noncitizen-voting-fraud

https://abcnews.com/Politics/wireStory/administrations-focus-noncitizen-voting-led-160-arrests-experts-136667964

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-lit-that-fire-of-capitol-insurrection-jan-6-committee-report-says

What percentage of registered Republicans are election deniers? I askeed Google AI and htis is what it reports:  Polling Data on 2020 Election Legitimacy

The Economist/YouGov Poll (June 2026): Found that 50% of Republicans believe the 2020 presidential election was "rigged". The number jumps significantly higher—to 66%—among Republicans who specifically identify as MAGA supporters. [1]
PRRI Survey: Consistently shows that roughly 63% of Republicans agree with the narrative that the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump. [1]
CNN/SSR Polls: Have historically tracked the figure between 63% and 69% of Republicans and Republican-leaners who view President Joe Biden's 2020 victory as illegitimate. [1]

"Opportunity for fraud" is a new phrase being used for committing fraud on voters by keeping the big lie going for 6 years

 "Opportunity for fraud" is  a new phrase being used for committing fraud on voters by keeping the big lie going for 6  years. and explaining away the lack of evidence, the 2020 election was stolen, Trump's fundamental basis for abusing his power is that the 2020 election was stolen.  It has been his excuse for most domestic acts he has taken to give J6 criminals and election denier icon Tina Peters a get-out-of-jail pass and to federalize elections so the big leader in the White House can more easily control the vote system and the outcome. This is in spite of those charged with seditiion or battering police officers or violating rules protecting ballot integrity have been given due process,  jury trials, pleading guilty, and after appeals upon appeals. Now, a new possible director of national intelligence, former SEC Chairman Jay Clayton, for Director of National Intelligence (DNI), is using the term "opportunity for fraud" to describe Trump's relentless search for an event. for which no court has found sufficient evidence so far in six years to change the 2020 outcome. Even Trjmps's own AG said the 2020 election was fraud-free.   Despite this, Trump is obsessed with keeping this lie alive, giving him the tool to rationalize a witch hunt because if there is smoke in the process itself and these isolated examples, there's certainly fire everywhere else.  and then he also has a pitch that puts.  into question any vote tally that does not go his way. For those in MAGA who dismiss the issue of evidence as some lib press and media,  or lib judges, trust the truth in every word coming from Trump, are those who are willing victims or ignorant of the deception of Trump's pitch that" since there is an opportunity for fraud, there is fraud."( In the case of California, it was uttered even before and during the counting was completed.) There is also a willful ignoring of the rigorous measures used to mitigate fraud, or of the lack of evidence that enough was done to overturn the outcome of 2020. 

 Even claiming "an opportunity for fraud" is another way to institutionalize an aura of paranoia, undermine faith in the electoral processes, give more fodder to Trump to fix what is not broken for political gain, and avoid looking like a loser, with such lies and insinuations.   https://mufticforumblog.blogspot.com/2026/06/how-do-you-tell-political-lie-from.html

The term "opportunity for fraud" is used in risk management of the systems proposed or in use by those who evaluate it because it indicates the steps needed to reduce the likelihood of that happening.  The fraud Truad has committed is to ignore and keep followers in the dark about the extreme measures, legitimate practices, and rules already required of compliant election officials to keep such "opportunities" to isolated examples.  There are thousands of county clerks and state election officials who are sworn to such risk management procedures, but the one who violated her oath to follow procedure is Tina Peters, who listened to Trump's speeches to "secure the votes cast". Instead of following the required procedure, she secured the vote tabulators by locking them. up and giving the codes for access to a MAGA loyal volunteer, tried to cover it up, lied, and got convicted by a trial of peers of violation of the state of Colorado criminal law. She appealed, and her conviction was upheld, though the sentence did not take into consideration her First Amendment rights to state her opinion, and Colorado Governor Polis released her from state prison after she had already served half her 9-year sentence. Note: her conviction was not overturned.  

For those who are ignorant of the procedures their clerks use to verify their votes, both in the registration process and in ensuring their ballots are counted, the "opportunity for fraud" needs to be scrutinized, as do the measures taken. States are in control of this per the Constitution, not the federal government.  Being ignorant of that is to fool oneself, and not understanding or learning about it is to be a willing fool. 

The key to having a voter's ballot counted, whatever the process, is that the signature at registration matches the signature on the ballot cast. That is true whether the voter received their ballot by mail, did not request it, requested it, mailed it, dropped it off, was "harvested" by someone else, or turned up in person at a polling place. or showed them their papers or didn't. In most instances, there are both red and blue clerks examining signatures, and if there is a question. The ballot is kept separate and provisional until the voter is given a chance to appeal. That makes "opportunity for fraud" rarely happen in reality. 

This constant drumbeat that there was fraud in 2020, in 2026 November there will also be fraud by libs and into 2028 asell, is in itself a fraud on their MAGA supporters.  There is a high leap between "opportunity for fraud" to actual evidence of fraud itself, and that "opportunity" appeals to either the blind loyal  (if Trump says it happens and will, it did and will) or to the unthinking ignorant who do not know squat about the process elections officials use to keep that risk at a minimum.  One would think that after 6 years, and with no evidence from both red and blue judges that the 2020 election was stolen, and based on isolated examples of those who tried to cheat getting caught, there was enough of this to have changed the outcome of the 2020 election.

A word to the media: Make how the vote counts, and the signature process works a big and ongoing story. Part of the problem is that it is easier to just cite court cases, but voters need a greater understanding of the processes used to mitigate fraud in the process they use.  This is a good one for local and state media since each local or state elections official have their own set  of rules and process.

Alive and active: voter suppression and the big lie. updated notes

Update 7 2025  In my own Grand County, Colorado, an election denier was elected county clerk and the Secretary of State had to take action in 2024. She had broken the protocol required to protect the chain of evidence and failed to affix seals. Missing seals in 2024 led Secretary of State’s Office to enact oversight on Grand County elections | SkyHiNews.com

With alarm, national and state GOP organizations have been taken over by-election deniers.  It is suspected that they are laying the groundwork to protest the 2024 presidential elections should Donald Trump lose again. It almost worked in 2020, so expect the same playbook in 2024. The same lie has a new use, not only to find an excuse for Trump's loss and the justification for the Jan.6 insurrection but now to become part of a scheme. The Election Deniers’ Playbook for 2024 | Brennan Center for Justice

   https://news.yahoo.com/election-deniers-taken-over-rnc-152548092.html

MUFTIC FORUM BLOG: Colorado county clerks revolt against GOP election denialism pressure

 One of the puzzles is that voters have less confidence in results in federal elections than they do in their state and local elections.  States use the same methods for all candidates, federal and state, and do not have separate systems or totals in votes cast for federal and another for state/county. This means that the myth that the 2020 election was stolen has its believers, and fear tactics regarding that have been effective. It also means something unusual has happened or could happen in specific elections that rigged the outcome.  Nothing widespread was ever found, but there have been prosecutions in Colorado in specific counties, Mesa, where the local county clerk was accused of giving specific access to her partisans to tinker with the machine's hard drives and now is facing a federal trial for that.  https://coloradosun.com/2024/01/08/tina-peters-federal-suit-rejected/      The conspiracy theories regarding Dominium Voting systems have likewise been debunked, and it cost those who promoted those false theories a bundle of money: https://apnews.com/article/fox-news-dominion-lawsuit-trial-trump-2020-0ac71f75acfacc52ea80b3e747fb0afe

So here's the GOP game: make it hard to vote hurts everyone, some more than others, updated 6/19/2021

Updated April 30, 2021 and  June 5 2021

Maybe the GOP might want to leave some rocks unturned as they attempt to make the case that Trump won the election because the otherside stole it. This guy is charged with murdering his wife and then voting as his dead or missing wife. It will be interesting to follow the trial to see how he was caught or if he is found guilty as charged.. Fraud-free elections do not mean people do not try to commit fraud. It means if they try, they will get caught in Colorado. The layers are safeguards are very large. The system of mail-in ballots with built-in safeguards against such fraud was devised by Republicans years ago and it has not been changed, even when administered by Democrats.

Mitch McConnell's line has been that GOP attempts in states they control to make it harder for people to vote is not intended to hurt African American turnout. Obviously, that bit of deceptive denial is aimed at those left in the GOP still with some degree of conscience..He is not speaking on behalf of the victims who see right through his BS. In fact, he has no sympathy or standing to be qualified to make that silly and hypocritical statement. Perhaps McConnell meant GOP voter suppression tactics were intended to stop the nonexistent widespread fraud they hyped and lied about in order to mask their true intentions.

:That argument got so little traction, he tried another argument June 19 in the face of a compromise worked out by Sen. Manchin. He is making it a states rights issue and an attempt to take power away from GOP-dominated state legislatures. McConnell rejects Manchin's voting rights compromise - Axios

What is so puzzling though, is the damage it will do to one group of GOP core supporters for whom mail-in ballots were designed by GOP-dominated state governments in the first place: white seniors. For that group, GOP strategists have shot their party in their own feet. It will be interesting to see the reaction the GOP gets when their own voters realize they got screwed, too...and their party leaders made their access to the ballot an unsurmountable hassle. Democrats in those states should make the new barriers to convenient voting the GOP erected a campaign issue that hurts all voters. https://www.axios.com/mitch-mcconnell-state-voter-suppression-19a21da7-0015-4fad-9105-0699e5600f70.html .

 Bogus voter fraud claims hurt us all, but some more than others. Our ability to vote conveniently in Colorado was under attack for some flawed reasoning.  In Colorado, a GOP Monument legislator introduced Senate Bill 7 that would have fundamentally upended Colorado's mail-in voting system by requiring all to request a mail-in ballot in advance.  Currently registered voters are automatically sent a ballot. It was sponsored by the legislator in the name of fraud prevention,  a problem which  Colorado did not have in 2020.  Fortunately for Colorado, the bill died in committee on February 23. Failing that, the same" break what's fixed"/ folks tried to get initiative 38 on the ballot that would have destroyed Colorado's popular mail-in ballot system as SB7 and/or requiring fingerprinting ID for any mail-in vote. This initiative will not be on the ballot in November because the state ballot title commission ruled it dealt with more than one subject and rejected it per provisions of state law limiting initiatives to a single subject.   

The Colorado mail-in voting system in effect since 2013 is considered by many to be the national gold standard of a system,with little fraud and greater voter participation.    Over 99% of votes cast in Colorado in November 2020 were by mail and Colorado had the second-highest percentage of voter participation in the US.  Colorado's model law has layers of administrative safeguards against fraud, as well. There has been no evidence of fraud increasing in Colorado since mail-in voting was instituted in 2013 per a study conducted by a professional statistical organization. .https://www.Westword.com/news/colorado-mail-ballots-voter-fraud-American-statisticians-study-11835239  

 While the bill to upend our mail-in system failed, legislators in GOP-dominated statehouses across the country are fixing what "ain't broke" while helping themselves politically by passing legislation to keep down the numbers who were likely to vote for their opponents.

Nationwide, there is no evidence of fraud that was significant enough to overturn the  2020  outcome, either. From Trump's attorney general Bill Barr and in over 50 courtrooms, that was the conclusion.  Instead,  Trump loyalists still controlling the GOP have attempted to explain this inconvenient truth away by a series of "what ifs" and "what about" and a few anecdotes. 

 If nationwide, the system "ain't" broke,  the GOP attempts would break it by adding unnecessary inconvenient hoops for voters to jump through. Here are some of the techniques similar to those included in the legislation already passed in Georgia and now in Florida in April. Shortening in-person voting hours, closing in-person polls after 5 pm so 9 to 5 or four tens employees cannot make it to the polls on time, permitting bias clerks to remove drop boxes for mail-in ballot returns, and to limit polling places for those voting in person in certain targeted neighborhoods, to cause them to stand in line for hours without drink or food,  making mail-in ballots go away, ending no-fault absentee voting, and to require an excuse to vote by mail, and to require the extra step of applying for an absentee ballot first,  or requiring government-issued photo identification even for mail-in ballots. Such tricks are geared to reduce the number of those groups able to vote who have limited transportation, who have no driver's licenses,  and who are more often brown or black than white.  Extending early vote days is no offset against such practices. The new Georgia law is backed by the GOP with a  claim African American voters would not be harmed." Just read the law's text", Sen Tim Scott opined in his GOP rebuttal to President Biden's state of the union address in April. The victims of these new laws, who did read it, found so many of these tricks noted above included or allowed in it, there are too many to list here. Just because some tricks are not listed in the law, they are by inference and omission allowed. Instead, go to.  https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/pol     Florida just passed its own similar version. Texas is on its way. The chances of federal legislation to prevent these kinds of suppressive efforts are slim, given the narrow Democratic margin in the Senate. The one factor that could change the Senate is the revolt of their funders, big business.  It must have come as a shock when businesses expressed opposition to such legislation. Why would they since they have always benefitted from the GOP position on low taxes and lax regulation? What is more important to their bottom line? Roger Altman believes it is the demographics of their employees and consumers. That one factor has changed as millennials increased in both groups who are more progressive than their elders. https://www.ft.com/content/f15d39d8-7261-4d59-bea5-b318e56775a1

Losers have a tendency to blame anything but themselves for coming up short.  However, Trump loyalists and conspiracy theorist partisans in Arizona are still trying to audit ballots based on theories of "what about" or "what if", months after independent and official audits and lost court challenges. This is taking this  "sore loser " attitude to a dangerous level.  Such fraud claims without evidence to support them have been pretexts for legislation that already resulted in making it harder for all older and younger Americans to vote, whether white, black, or brown.   We already are aware that the "stop the steal" slogan is what motivated the rioters on January 6 who meant to terrorize the legislators to vote against the certification of Biden as president.  Some rioters even wanted to kill the leadership of both parties as the conviction of neo-Nazi Brendon Hunt revealed in testimony early this May. The January 6 attack failed to stop the certification, but with so many cheering the violent participants on, including Trump and a handful of GOP senators, that may not be the last time trying to overturn an election by violence happens. That January 6 riot was no soccer fan hooliganism that ends a sporting event.  It is a taste of how democracy as the way we are governed can end.  

May 5, 2021 update. Facebook continues its ban on Trump but will re-examine in 6 months. The reason: the threat of violence is still real. I see what this means. This is an implication that Trump's posts incite violence and that "stop the steal" is still the slogan Trump continues to exhort. https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2021/05/05/facebook-trump-ban-permanent-oversight-board-ruling/4377852001/

Trump has no one to blame but himself as he continues to foment his "stop the steal" rhetoric which fueled Jan. 6. He has not stopped and neither have his violent followers or the fellow travelers who call them patriots.

Thomas Friedman May 4 posted an opinion piece in the New York Times that GOP actions suppression voters are trying to be a minority party to rule over the majority.. In time, fears Friedman, the only end is a civil war.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/04/opinion/gop-trump-2020-election.html

Friedman is no raving lefty...but one of the most thoughtful and supportive of the kind of democracy we have now. Coming from him, this column is just darned scary. https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/5/5/2029049/..

 _More commentary below. Also see the posting about Liz Cheney and the Emporer has no clothes_________________________________________________________ 

In order to find fraud in voting in 2020 five months later the GOP and Trump loyalists are still searching either to vindicate Trump's claim the election was stolen or to try to oust Biden and replace him with Trump.  In Arizona, the effort has taken some wacky turns.  Biden won the state by 10,000 votes and finding enough fraud overturns the outcome looks like a fool's errand given the number of audits taken with the Arizona vote subsequently certified after intensive audit scrutiny.  That partisan conspiracy theorists are running that show and impartial observers have been denied entry, the findings will not be taken seriously. There are no provisions in the Constitution for replacing an already Congressional certified and sworn-in president for that reason anyway. 

Such voting laws making it harder and more inconvenient for certain demographic groups to exercise their Constitutionally given rights have already been signed into law in Georgia and in Florida in April   Concerted attempts by the GOP to do the same are being made in all fifty statehouses whether dominated by the GOP or not.

The attempt to find fraud in 2020  elections happened in Colorado.  A Grand Junction County clerk tried to claim fraud, but could not provide evidence.     Claims made like the Grand County clerk's that Dominion voting systems would permit multiple votes have lately resulted in huge defamation suits by the Denver-based company against perpetrators of the unproved theory,  including against Rudy Guiliani. For states that truly care about making it easy for all to vote with confidence that elections are secure, they should give serious consideration to  Colorado's legislation model.. There has been no evidence of fraud increasing since mail-in voting was instituted in 2013 per a study conducted by a professional statistical organization. .https://www.westword.com/news/colorado-mail-ballots-voter-fraud-american-statisticians-study-11835239   

Stopping fraud is not the real game; it is a cover for another agenda.  However, keeping the lie of widespread voter fraud alive is part of the strategy to garner public support for restrictive voter legislation.    Coded words delivered with a wink to those in on the joke are no longer necessary because some in the GOP actually spilled the beans to the rest of us..  ‘Everybody Shouldn’t Be Voting,’ Republican Blurts Out (nymag.com)  An Arizona state legislator, Representative John Kavanagh, a Republican  who chairs Arizona’s Government and Elections Committee was not the first to publicly claim only "quality" voters should vote and. the goal was not quantity. What the rest of us need are quality legislators who can comprehend and honor the Constitution and legislate fairly and intelligently.  I am trying to find the word "quality" in the Constitution as a condition for approved voters. It just is not there. Literacy tests were declared unconstitutional years ago and intelligence tests and current affairs knowledge, we can assume, would be off-limits, too. What those like Kavanaugh really mean is no secret now, thanks to his slip of a loose tongue. Black and browns are just assumed to be "low quality", it appears.  That may be what the GOP thinks or wishes, but the emperor now has no clothes  Until then, the GOP had been cloaked in the piety of preventing fraud, real, imagined, fantasy, or feared. Their real goal is now bared naked for the world to see. Their agenda is to make it inconvenient for  particularly those of low wealth and limited access to transportation who are more likely to be black or brown and not likely to vote for Republicans.

The left calls the Trump loyalist claim that Biden was elected because of widespread voter fraud "the big lie".  Their justification of concluding this  is  there was no evidence of any significant numbers to make a difference in the outcome in the presidential race. they pointo to the fact that the GOP had 60 chances before judges of all ideological ilk to present their evidence of enough widespread fraud to change the local or state outcome, and they failed. Trump loyalists still controlling the GOP have attempted to explain this inconvenient truth away by a series of "what ifs" and "what abouts" and a few  anecdotes   Those who  made such arguments in court in November and December and provided no evidence were tossed out of court by judges.  In response, even to this day Trump loyalists are attempting to prove Qanon type theories are true. In Arizona, the fantasy continues with a partisan-backed attempt to recount ballots cast five months ago to show fraud, that Trump really won that state, and should be sworn in as president unhorsing Biden somehow. There are no provisions in the Constitution for that kind of action after Congress certifies the vote, as they did in the evening of January 6.  Those in Arizona recounting the ballots hired a conspiracy theorist-headed company to try to prove theories advanced by QAnon that indeed the 2020 election was stolen from Trump.  No non-partisan independent observers were not permitted in this process well after the count was underway when the State finally sent in such qualified observers. The fear was that in their ballot handling, these partisan counters could be altering the original ballots. The exercise could not result in overturning the election of already sworn in Joe Biden since there is no provision in the Constitution for that. 

  Here are some of the techniques included in the legislation already passed in Georgia and now in Florida. Shortening in person voting hours, closing in-person polls after 5 pm so 9 to 5 or four tens employees cannot make it to the polls on time, removing drop boxes for mail in ballot returns and polling places for those voting in person, in certain targeted neighborhoods, causing them to stand in line for hours without drink or food,  making mail-in ballots go away, ending no-fault absentee voting, or requiring an excuse and the extra step of applying for an absentee ballot, or requiring government issues photo identification even for mail-in ballots. Such dirty tricks are to reduce the number of those with limited transportation, who have no driver's licenses,  and have low income who are more often brown or black than White.  The new Georgia law is backed by the GOP with a bogus claim African American voters would not be harmed."Just read the law's text, they claim. That is not the view of the victims of these new laws, but so many of these tricks noted  above are included in it, they are too many to list here. Instead, go to.  https://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/politics/546099-georgia-election-law-prevents-african-american-latinx-others. This is Jim Crow 2021 by another name.

In Arizona, the fantasy continues with a partisan-backed attempt to recount ballots cast five months ago to show fraud, that Trump really won that state, and should be sworn in as president unhorsing Biden somehow. There are no provisions in the Constitution for that kind of action after Congress certifies the vote, as they did in the evening of January 6.  Those in Arizona recounting the ballots hired a conspiracy theorist-headed company to try to prove theories advanced by QAnon that indeed the 2020 election was stolen from Trump.  No non-partisan independent observers were not permitted in this process well after the count was underway when the State finally sent in such qualified observers. The fear was that in their ballot handling, these partisan counters could be altering the original ballots. The exercise could not result in overturning the election of already sworn in Joe Biden since there is no provision in the Constitution for that. 

The danger of such suppression and false claims now is not only questioning democracy as the best system of reflecting governance by the people's will, instead of by some self-serving autocrat, but what it would portend for the future. The danger is that partisans will use this same excuse in the future to question any election outcome. This same lie the election was stolen was used to incite the January 6 rioters who tried to scare Congress into overturning the 2020 fifty state-certified election results that endured extensive court scrutiny and were motivated by their allegiance to their leader, Donald Trump with their blind belief that the vote was stolen by fraud because he told them so, ignoring lack of evidence and/or such lack of evidence being excused by  "what if" unproved theories. The peaceful transition of power as provided in the Constitution was at stake, opening up further violent acts of sedition conducted by any disgruntled group who wants to overturn an election and established some dear leader as their ruler, instead of adhering to the system that has served us for so well for 250 years. 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/experts-call-for-federal-monitors-of-arizona-election-audit-citing-violations-of-voting-laws/ar-BB1gfMMh?ocid=msedgdhp  

https://fortune.com/2021/04/14/ceos-republican-voting-laws-voter-suppression-apple-amazon-blackrock-facebook-warren-buffett/

.https://www.westword.com/news/colorado-mail-ballots-voter-fraud-american-statisticians-study-11835239 

‘Everybody Shouldn’t Be Voting,’ Republican Blurts Out (nymag.com)

https://www.ft.com/content/f15d39d8-7261-4d59-bea5-b318e56775a1  Roger Altman explains why big business opposes voter suppression laws....demographics of employees and customers

https://coloradosun.com/2021/02/22/republicans-propose-changes-colorado-mail-voting/

https://www.5280.com/2020/05/no-fraud-isnt-rampant-in-colorados-mail-in-voting-system/

https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/28/politics/brendan-hunt-guilty-threatening-assault-murder-members-congress/index.html

  https://apnews.com/article/election-2020-colorado-grand-junction-elections-pat-toomey-37210b8c548325a7976be4bff2f87d00

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/25/us/politics/rudy-giuliani-dominion-tru

https://www.businessinsider.com/everyone-dominion-smartmatic-suing-defamation-election-conspiracy-theories-2021-2

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 But that is really not these GOP goals. We know that now because they could enact such workable laws if they wanted to. There are successful models to follow if they cared to encourage all to vote and still guard against fraud.. Since 2013 I have been voting by mail in Colorado and I am a big city  (Denver) former election official.  I marvel at the checks and double-checks built into the system to prevent fraud. It can be done. It was devised by a GOP-dominated legislature and shaped by a GOP Secretary of State and the implementation continued by a Democrat Secretary of State with an agenda to make it easy to vote and to prevent fraud. You have to get into the weeds of rule making and administrative procedure conforming to the legislation to grasp it, but given the history of a lack of voter fraud since the Colorado law was enacted years ago, it has worked to protect against fraud.

Better informed voters are not really  GOP goals either. We know that now. If that kind of quality is your concern, do it by mail. I have found that I am also able to take time, study the issues and candidates, at home. The Blue Book and whatever information  I need to understand the issues and candidate is sitting on the kitchen table as I go through the ballot since I got the ballot in the mail sent to registered voters.  I do not need to get a doctor's permission slip or take the extra step to fill and send a mail request to get an absentee ballot. I have no excuses. There it is staring at me on the table so I can get it right without having to wing it in a voting booth.. I am making more informed decisions than ever have.  If the quality of decision-making is defined as an informed voter is the goal, doing it by mail makes it more possible. But that is not what those legislators mean by "quality", is it?  We know that now, don't we.

These suppression attempts are springing up in over 40 states. This points to a need for passage of federal legislation like HR-1 and SB-1to stop these voter suppression tactics. They cropped up because Supreme Court decisions gutted many enforcement provisions of prior voting rights laws and GOP leaders felt free to revert to past laws.  Many formerly slave states with GOP-dominated legislatures and statehouses were alarmed that nonwhite voters made the difference in their Senate and House races and cost them elections. Other states whose politics were dominated by Trump-aligned state government officials have followed Trump's party line or used their sponsorship of such voter suppression tactics to establish their Trump follower bonefides.

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 Colorado Vs. Georgia Voting Laws: What Are The Differences? | Colorado Public Radio (cpr.org)  The MLB will play their All-Star game at Coors Field in Denver as a protest to Georgia's proposed voter suppression laws.  Colorado is considered the gold standard on voter participation laws and there is a very significant difference, per the CPR article. Fraud fears in Colorado?None: Colorado does require voter ID to vote in person but it does not require voter ID to vote by mail, unlike Georgia. Voter ID in Colorado permits 16 kinds of ID, but in Georgia, only 6 kinds.  Georgia's new law does enlarge early voting in person a few days more than Colorado, but  99.3 of Colorado voters vote by mail with out the two step hassle of request ballot, provide ID mail in voting as in Georgia. Per the CPR report" Kemp and others also have said that Colorado requires photo identification to vote, which is false."  .https://www.5280.com/2020/05/no-fraud-isnt-rampant-in-colorados-mail-in-voting-system/ Colorado has mail-in voting and it has very effective ways to deal with fraud.  

Per the NYT aritcle "Representative John Kavanagh, a Republican legislator w

ho chairs Arizona’s Government and Elections Committee and is shepherding through a bill to make voting more cumbersome and therefore rare, described his party’s motives with blundering candor."“There’s a fundamental difference between Democrats and Republicans,” he told CNN. “Democrats value as many people as possible voting, and they’re willing to risk fraud. Republicans are more concerned about fraud, so we don’t mind putting security measures in that won’t let everybody vote — but everybody shouldn’t be voting … Not everybody wants to vote, and if somebody is uninterested in voting, that probably means that they’re totally uninformed on the issues. Quantity is important, but we have to look at the quality of votes, as well.”

         

What transactional meant to Trump is not what we first thought

After four years we now know what being a "transactional president" really means. It came into even sharper focus in the days between November 3 and the vote of the Electoral College. It was also an element in impeachment. Being transactional was not what many first thought. We now know from experience Trump meant being transactional was his modus operandi to get his way in everything, not just in trade deals, and doing it with corrupt intent or not.

Like many, I initially thought Trump meant that he, as a great businessman, knew how to drive a hard bargain with the Chinese or other trade deals because he had mastered the art of the deal. Horse trading, dealing, and self-interest are also the stuff of which politics and compromises are often made. There were no high minded values, national security, and general national welfare that were the primary concerns involved in many of the kinds of deals Donald Trump negotiated, implied, or in which he anticipated paybacks. It can also be a fundamental definition of corruption if there are abuses by public officials with intentions to pad their personal purse or add to political personal advantage, bribery, to induce others to break the law, or for the initiating dealer to break the law himself and ignoring the Constitutional constraints while doing it.

It was much more than just an '"I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine". For Trump, it was he expected "favors returned for favors given." It also became to mean " if my favors are not returned, I'll ruin you via tweet and try to get you prosecuted via the Department of Justice or primaried and have your political future destroyed". It meant he expects those to whom he gave a job or position or helped them achieve their goals to put loyalty to him over anything else, including violating the oath of office to which they swore to honor.

There are several "transactional deals" Trump put forth either implied or overtly that are the poster children examples of what "transactional" meant to him.. One was Trump's attempt to use federal dollars and weapons to force the Ukraine president to find dirt on the Bidens."I have a favor to ask though" as in the next sentence or two he implied there were those military weapons Ukraine wanted. He did not express the deal so crassly, but the context and the sequence were all he needed. That got him impeached, though partisan loyalty and fear of retribution got him acquitted in the Senate, even when some GOP senators admitted quietly the House impeachment managers made their case but still voted to acquit him.

The other was his expecting loyalty from his appointees to the federal judiciary and the Supreme Court. It was overtly expressed by Trump that was the reason he wanted Amy Coney Barrett's nomination to the Supreme Court rushed before the election .Per the election, fearing a tie vote, he said, “I think this will end up in the Supreme Court. We need nine justices.” He must have expected judges and justices in the court system, lower and higher, to put aside the law, and instead vote to support his expressed goal to throw out votes against him in a close election.

It meant that GOP public officials in charge of managing the presidential vote were expected to "overturn" the popular vote because mail-in ballots and African American votes were defacto fraudulent, even though there was no evidence. .That is the way it works in autocracies so why should it not work for him? He had the power and immunity from criminal prosecution. He made telephone calls, tweets, and held meetings to pressure his beneficiaries. December 8 that transaction bore no fruit as the Supreme Court without dissent of any justice, including his three appointees, rejected an appeal to overturn the Pennsylvania vote. Before that, his attempt to upend the public vote in lower courts went down in flames as 35 plus lawsuits were decided against his attempt to get the will of the people reversed on any pretext of cases brought before the courts. Judges who were appointed by Democrats and Republicans, including those who were put in place by Trump and the GOP in the past four years by Senate action, ruled against Trump's expressed desire to overturn the vote. The single case his lawyers won did not affect the vote outcome.

Trump forgot one basic fact In any transaction. It takes two parties to agree to a transaction. So far, the justices and judges were loyal to the letter of the law, not to the deal of Trump.

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Trump...the master of mind control pre and post Nov.3

In social media dialogs with dedicated Trump supporters, I have got to hand it to Trump. He is a master of mind control. and he is the master of a universe he himself helps shape. What is reality has become what media outlet a person watches exclusively. That is the single most important factor causing such a sharply divided nation. There seems to be an Earth A and an Earth B existing side by side. Reality to him is what FOX and Friends and Hannity broadcast, and the lines are blurred with who is influencing whom. Trump if anything is a TV-shaped and shaping creature. He is where he is because of his TV stardom in an echo chamber of his making..That he watches FOX hours a day is documented in his tweets, his former staff, and his own comments and his using them as his kitchen cabinet to shape public policy. That is the reality he wants for his followers to perceive, even if he himself knows otherwise.

Post-Nov. 3, the Trumpists still promote Earth B, defying the election results in spite of no evidence of fraud..and his attorneys have been laughed out of court.  Nonetheless, the propaganda machines are hard at work drumming up social media and "news" stories that are bogus, purporting to show evidence of fraud...and debunked by ABC news showing how they have tried to do this: https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/election-2020-debunking-false-misleading-videos-claiming-show/story?id=74148233&fbclid=IwAR27lopUFT2RVS91tB5q-XwvxDNxu0bxcQXkXG784dG4RKf0H1HbR5Cnu-s

CNN’s Tapper Shreds GOP For Enabling Trump as He Foments Post-Election Threats: ‘Did You Not Know Who This Man Was?’ (msn.com)

Example #1 of how effective Trump's propaganda machine is: https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/526204-south-dakota-nurse-says-many-dying-patients-still-insist-covid-19-not?fbclid=IwAR2pe8JLapCvGdUnXgyo-fAfUC6ylfXAqrJ-R9WITgCCSdRC3_114KWthgQ

Example #2: Crossing Trump's propaganda machine gets you fired. https://www.npr.org/2020/11/17/936003057/cisa-director-chris-krebs-fired-after-trying-to-correct-voter-fraud-disinformati

Example # 3: Trump's crowd-size lies did not end with his inauguration crowd. How about these Trumpsters tricks: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/nov/17/facebook-posts/photos-show-cleveland-cavaliers-parade-and-womens-/?fbclid=IwAR0YCtmfQ3oZzQDMC6utWHibXXsncwyrDan3HfGoXUaHzFBKZR-RKH4cV1g

Pre November 3.:

Foxated on Hunter Biden?  Funny how that story came about and where it went. Here is an example how Fox media

made it into a big nothing.How the Hunter Biden Laptop Story Disappeared from Fox News Prime Time After the Election (msn.com)

Back in the communist era in the USSR and also in Nazi Germany, there was a political commissar in charge of making sure thoughts, words, and deeds conformed to the political leader or party line, throughout their society. Now, in the Trump administration, it appears there are informal commissars who make scientific reports curtailed, rewritten, or buried, particularly when it comes to mortality figures of COVID regardless of scientific findings or the effectiveness of masks and the timing of the availability of immunizations. We may not yet have a dictatorship, but our wannabe autocrat, Donald Trump, is showing the same tendencies to act as others before him did. (for more on how members of our family experienced this first hand see another posting of the blog: https://mufticforumblog.blogspot.com/2020/09/trumps-political-commissars-are-at-work.html    What Trump is doing is even more insidious than either Stalin or Tito because both of these mid-20th-century communists appeared to believe in their own ideology, but Trump believed one thing and told his followers to believe something else.

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How many times have you heard from his mouth not " to believe what you hear or see" and. believe him instead?

We should have gotten a clue when he exaggerated the size of his inauguration audience, even when photo comparisons with Obama's audience his inauguration were shown side by side. There is another world out there that takes data from scientific sources, evidence, and experience as reality and believe what they see, hear, experience and rationally consider.

How and why does he do it?. It is not always a matter of ignorance, or forgotten school lessons, ADHD, or lack of reading comprehension many presumed. It is not that he is ignorant of science. He knows how the disease spreads. He is a germaphobe and, he fears human physical contact by a handshake or a sympathetic hug with the public, as he called" disgusting" supporters attending his rallies, per a former Pence aid. It may be he is driven by instinct instead of calculation, but it is effective in shaping the public perception that favors him, the person.
If anything speaks to his being driven by calculation, it was revealed by Bob Woodward's book RAGE,. It was Trump's intentional manipulation to shape and bond with his core followers with the self-knowledge of the deadly danger of COVID, caught on Woodward's tape, while simultaneously telling his followers it was just like the usual flu and not to worry.

.It takes two to validate one another and he has an uncanny ability to know what rings the chimes of at least 40% of voters. This is not to say his voters do not know their own minds. . They do. He just amplifies the depth of their anger, fears, racial prejudices, a desire for a "strong leader" to save them, and/or economic self-interest as he plays to it and intensifies it The roar of a maskless indoor rally crowd in Henderson, NV, or Tulsa, or TV ratings and media coverage of his tweets validate what he utters is working to cultivate loyal followers. as well an understanding that resonates with them. They think if they act like COVID is over, it is over, so why wear a mask, while experts warn we have not turned the corner, as Trump trumpets. It has just plateaued until winter drives activities indoors and the usual flu season begins.
When every news outlet, domestic and foreign, write and report something else than what FOX and Trump media report, the reality is not just a matter of perception, gut feel, or hunch. He is an intentional manipulator. of other people's thoughts, even when he knows the evidence indicates the contrary. which he acknowledges as the truth in private.
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More....
As a first-hand witness to Russian consolidation of control of East Germany and spending in-person time in a country run by a dictator and over 50 years being married to a refugee from communist Yugoslavia,I noted the first strategy used by these dictators to get and keep power is to block, and jam all news from the West and the only news allowed was their version. It was a method of mind control. that was also physica.l..No western publications or radio reports are allowed. In these days the menu and access to a smorgasbord of news providers online, the way unfavorable news is blocked by the Trumpsters is with four years of claiming any source others that their approved ones were called "fake news. " . . Trump himself has conditioned his followers to block out inconvenient facts and news, not physically, but in their minds. He has dismissed any news except that coming by Fox and Trump's approved news sources as "fake". It began with "alternative facts" at the early years of the Trump administration to his continued damning every other source except his approved ones...and his willing followers and worshippers of Trump himself are more than willing to comply. There is one particular stock answer that I see pop up on some Facebook sites, terming any news from any source, domestic and foreign, that provides facts and data that expose Trump's spin as "fake news", presenting no proof, data, or information to the contrary....just the two-word comment: "fake news". I appreciate those who do provide "alternative facts' and sources, but I also find the same Trump supporters are still calling inconvenient news stories dismissed as "fake" as well, even when presented with data, evidence, and facts,. 

The service that Bob Woodward provided in his book "RAGE", and corresponding tapes of Trump's own voice is to expose his intentional distortion of "facts to the contrary", to be just the opposite to the public of what he admitted to Woodward on tape privately. Top of that list is Trump's wilful lies that COVID is no big thing, just like the flu...at exactly the same time he acknowledged the deadly and infectious nature of COVID...In the past couple of days he now sets out to denigrate facemasks again and launch a policy of "herd mentality", which would require the death totals in the US to be at least 2 million (10 times the current deaths), and 60% of US population to survive the infection. He is leading by example and calling out Biden from wearing facemasks since Biden does lead by example himself. Trump is holding indoor maskless rallies and telling red state governors with spikes in COVID to do away with mandatory mask-wearing. .The result is not just a political tactic, it is also a matter of life and death. .for his own supporters ...and .as an 82-year-old, for my likely premature death from mask shunners. My answer is another nine or ten months of lockdown until vaccines will be available to the general public, per the CDC 9/17.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/14/us/politics/trump-rally.html https://www.businessinsider.com/video-aide-trump-didnt-want-to-shake-hands-disgusting-supporters-2020-9

 

Donald Trump is his own worst enemy in search of voter fraud

Donald Trump is often his own worst enemy. He still has  not gotten over that he did not win the popular vote, so therefore he is insecure that people quetion if  his election was legitimate. He is constantly shooting himself in the foot  by often  bringing up the issue as he tries to justify that the 3 million vote gap was due to "voter fraud" committed by  three million illegial immigrants.

What is truly self defeating is that his opponents, including Hillary Clinton, did not nor does not question whether he was elected legitimately and never challenged it.  There was no effort by anyone to try to unseat him becaue of that.  Instead of letting that issue  lie, he is constantly trying to make the point that he won the popular vote, too. It is just because 3 million illegal immigrants voted for Clinton, he claims. . In doing that, he is constantly reminding  the public he lost the popular vote. That in itself is not a good public relations strategy, but it will be an even worse disaster when a "commission" charged with finding those three million pesky immigrants come up with a nothing burger.

In order to seek verification of his suppositions, he has set up a  commission.charged with proving false facts are actually ture.   He is stacking the deck, appointing vice chair  Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach,  the loudest voice in the US asseting  massive voter fraud and advocating ultra strict  voter ID laws. This will not be a true impartial fact finding commissio.  It will be a hunt to find  phantom 3 million illegals who should not have voted that  caused Trump to lose the popular vote.

These claims have already been debunked by such independent bodies as PEW research, and the Brennan Center for Justice, as well as other GOP secretaries of state. Kobach and group will be undertaking a wild goose chase and the results can only be embarrassing. It could also show that Trump indeed lost the popular vote, no matter what he keeps claiming..

If the commission seeks to justify voter suppression laws, they could  be baying at the moon.  Lower courts  have struck down  states'  voter suppression measures  and voter ID laws recently passed in Texas, Wisconsin, Ohio, and South Dakota.  Do these strict ID laws suppress minority votes? Studies show they do, with voter participation less than in  states without such restrictive laws. White voter rates were not affected.

 The Supreme Court  May 15 2017 announced it refused to hear the North Carolina law, billed as the worst racially motivated voter law in the US,. The ruling let a lower court finding stand, but the rulling was based not on its merits, but on a messy appeals process. With a GOP dominated Supreme Court, expect the merits of such kinds of legislation to be decided later. The lower court had found the North Carolina  law was specifically designed to hobble Black voters. Some of the provisions aimed to suppress Black votes were ending Sunday early voting, requiring ID's most  Blacks did not have, and reducing early voting hours and places. Those crafting the law had conducted a study of Black voting habits, and then aimed  specific legislation to make it harder for that group to vote.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/02/15/do-voter-identification-laws-suppress-minority-voting-yes-we-did-the-research/
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https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/11/us/politics/trump-voter-fraud.html?_r=0

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/07/29/courts-smash-voter-suppression-just-in-time-for-election-day

http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/15/politics/supreme-court-north-carolina-voter-id/

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/5/19/1663750/-Voting-Rights-Roundup-Supreme-Court-won-t-revive-North-Carolina-GOP-s-racist-voter-suppression-law

https://thinkprogress.org/north-carolina-voter-law-dead-6dc027569681

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/25/us/politics/trump-voting-fraud-false-claim-investigation.html

https://www.brennancenter.org/analysis/debunking-voter-fraud-myth

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/315914-author-of-study-spicer-cited-we-found-no-evidence-of-voter

http://www.npr.org/2016/08/05/488748072/stricter-voter-id-and-other-voting-laws-rolled-back-in-slew-of-court-decisions