Trump's backers turn to that speech he made to the Capitol rioters and see in it evidence-after-evidence of voter fraud. His claims fomented a riot the likes of which our nation has never seen. Were the claims true? I have not had time to look at all of them, but I offer you many of them. I think it important that Trump supporters look into what Trump is saying, for where these accusations have us headed as a nation is not peace. Within the last hour, a Facebook friend of mine messaged me, saying, "I think civil war would be horrible but it might be necessary. Not sure enough people on the right have the will for the ultimate sacrifice but the fait of USA is relying on it." He is suggesting that violence -- a civil war, no less -- is necessary. He is one of the millions of Americans who believe that the charges of election fraud are true, and he is ready to go to war over them. The Capitol Riot may be over, but the false charges of election fraud are still being used to foment insurrection. Who knows what lies ahead. It becomes imperative that we reach out to these people and help them understand that what Trump is saying conflicts with the truth and could lead to the destruction of our nation.
Claim from Trump: The rules in Pennsylvania were changed in violation of the state constitution to allow people to vote by mail. Those votes by mail, therefore, should be thrown out.
Act 77 was enacted, and does allow mail-in voting. Act 77 is not, though, in violation of the state's constitution, which gives the legislature authority to, "provide a manner in which, and the time and place at which, qualified electors . . . may . . . be absent." There is no place in the state constitution that precludes voting by mail, and there is no place that says the legislature cannot make laws on that issue. In fact, as quoted above, the constitution gives them such authority, even though that is the opposite of what the Trump people are saying.
Claim from Trump: Pennsylvania abolished the signature verification requirements just 11 days before the election.
The state supreme court did rule against allowing election officials from tossing out ballots because they supposedly did not match. The court could find no such requirement in the laws of the state. We often fault courts for creating laws, for ruling based on what they think the law should say, instead of what it does say. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court refused to do that, and is now being chided for just following the law. Note this, also: Allowing the election vote-counters to decide which signatures matched and which ones didn't opens the door for subjective review and even partisan vote harvesting. The election officials are not trained in handwriting analysis. To give them authority to toss some ballots out because in their opinion they do not match is to give them the ability to toss out votes of a candidate whose vote they do not like.
Claim from Trump: "In Pennsylvania, you had 205,000 more votes than you had voters."
Trump's charge is based on the word of State Representative Frank Ryan, a Republican, who issued a press release saying there were 6,962,607 ballots cast, yet only 6,760,230 voters. Election officials suggest Ryan's figures were based on incomplete data. In actuality, there, yes, were 6.9 million ballots cast, but that was from a larger pool of voters, 9 million voters.
Claim from Trump: "Over 8,000 ballots in Pennsylvania were cast by people whose names and dates of birth matched individuals who died in 2020 and prior. Think of that, dead people!"
If you are looking for people who match names and use the birth dates of others who have the same name, you'll find plenty. There are 9 million voters. Attaching wrong birthdates is an obvious way to twist the facts. Truth is, though, there was only one case found of a person registering for a dead person -- and that was for a Republican who said he cast that fraudulent vote for Trump.
Claim from Trump: "Not only are they voting, they want an application to vote. One of them was 29 years ago died. It's incredible."
I've not been able to find anything on this specific claim. As stated above, though, only one case of a person trying to register as a dead person was found.
Claim from Trump: More than 10,000 votes in Pennsylvania were illegally counted as they came in after election day.
About 10,000 votes were received after election day. That part is true. They were not illegal votes, however, as a three-day grace period is allowed for the ballots to arrive. So, if your ballot was postmarked by Nov. 3, but didn't arrive until Nov. 6, it should and would still be counted. '
Claim from Trump: 60,000 ballots in Pennsylvania were received back before they were supposedly even mailed out.
Much of the scanning is done by hand, with the date it gets scanned entered as the date it was received. So, if ballot counters fell behind -- and they did -- in inputting the ballots received, it would appear ballots were received back before they were mailed in. In addition, you can go pick up your ballot and cast it right on the spot, meaning it could have the same date for being received as for being mailed out. Should the Trump have acknowledged this in making his accusation? Of course. Honesty tells the whole story. You can twist the truth to make it appear to be something it's not.
Claim from Trump: Twenty-five thousand ballots in Pennsylvania were requested by nursing home residents, all in a single giant batch . . . indicating an enormous, illegal ballot harvesting operation.
This charge seems to have originated from Sen. Lindsey Graham. He made the charge on Fox News about a week after the election. Graham did not say where he got this information. He did say the charge was being looked into. I am not finding any follow-up. It seems odd that Graham would make the charge, say it is being looked into, and then fail to follow up, himself. At any rate, this is a charge that needs more investigation.
Claim from Trump: The day before the election, Pennsylvania reported the number of absentee ballots sent out. Then, the day after the election, they increased the count by 400,000 ballots.
Could not find anything on this, either. But, it is possible Trump was drawing off a charge made by Rudy Giuliani, in which Giuliani claimed there were only 1,823,143 ballots sent out and yet 2,589,242 mail-in votes were cast. Giuliani mixed the number of people who registered in the June primary with the number of people who voted in the November election. That sleight-of-hand made it appear there was election fraud when there wasn't.
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