Election Stolen? Fact or Fantasy? You Decide.
Watch a researcher separate fact from hype so you can be a more informed voter
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« I ask your indulgence this week. Given the importance of this topic and the election timing, I thought it deserved a more thorough treatment. I’d appreciate your hanging in there and reading to the end. It’s important. »
Summary of My Conclusions From A Deep Dive Into 2020 Election Fraud Claims:
American democracy is based on the individual’s right to vote
Conservative groups, Trump’s consultant, and Bill Barr agree 2020 was fair
Trump knows that he fairly lost the election per his own Attorney General
The only person who cannot accept the 2020 results is Trump
There are real questions about Trump’s mental state
A person who undermines elections, deceives his followers, and/or is delusional should not be President
One citizen … one vote. That is the foundation of a democracy and a cherished right for all US citizens, and a right that I take seriously.1 Even if you live under a rock, you have no doubt heard claims that Joe Biden did not win the 2020 election and that it was “stolen.” It would be easy to dismiss these claims as those of a sore loser, but what if there was merit to the claim? As an American first, I would be deeply troubled if there truly was election fraud, no matter who won, so I decided to do some digging around to see if I could come to a solid conclusion for myself. Fortunately, there are groups from all political sides that have deeply analyzed the “stolen election” claim.2 Here is what my investigation uncovered, laid out as objectively as I can, for you to process and decide on your own.3
Initial image created by Ed Paulson using Copilot in Windows 11 then modified in Photoshop.
In December, 2021 the Association Press (AP) formed a team of 11 reporters to investigate claims of voter fraud in six states where Trump had claimed “millions of people voted illegally.”4
The AP’s reporters talked with approximately 340 election officials from these targeted states and asked them specifically to identify any potential instances of voter fraud that they had flagged during their post-election certification and canvassing work. In other words, if there was a suspicion of voter fraud on an individual ballot, these were the people who would investigate it. Researchers call this primary data because it is the original source data upon which all other analysis is based.5
The AP reporters found just less than 475 potential total cases of voter fraud from all six states. 475! This is not even close to the number of votes that would have changed the election outcome and 475 is a much, much, much smaller number than “many millions.”
I also found the Campaign Legal Center (CLC) which did a study of all 60 stolen election claim legal cases filed on Trump’s behalf. CLC claims to be non-partisan and according to Wikipedia, was founded by Trevor Potter a former Republican chairman of the Federal Election Commission so I would expect them to be more friendly toward Trump in their analysis. Many cases were dismissed before going to trial and the rest were reviewed by the court and found to be without merit. In Arizona, “The court determined that plaintiff (Trump’s folks) brought the suit for the ‘improper purpose’ of undermining Arizonans’ confidence in election results, rather than to defend election integrity as they claimed.” Wow!6
To get a more critical viewpoint about election integrity, I looked for any evidence that supported the 2020 election was "stolen." The search turned up an article in The Hill about a consultant named Ken Block who was hired by Trump to investigate the election results for fraud. Unfortunately for Trump, his own consultant found no evidence to indicate that the election was stolen. Block writes, “What the (election fraud) claims don’t take into account is that voter fraud is detectable, quantifiable, and verifiable. I have yet to see anyone offer up ‘evidence’ of voter fraud from the 2020 election.”7
You can imagine how well the meeting went when Block had to tell Trump that he found no evidence of fraud. I give him credit for standing by his findings, even knowing that it would likely cost him a client. I hope he got paid for his work? As a long-time consultant, I can say that clients are often unwilling to pay for results that they don’t like, and we all know about Trump’s history not paying his small business contractors.
To gain additional conservative perspective, I found a study published by the Cato Institute, which I would consider a conservative leaning organization. Their report also found no evidence of election fraud.
The title of the Cato Institute report says it all – “Lost, not Stolen: The Conservative Case that Trump Lost and Biden Won the 2020 Presidential Election.”8
Finally, let’s see what Trump’s own Attorney General, Bill Barr, had to say about all of this. Mr. Barr held arguably one of the most powerful legal positions in government at the time of the 2020 election, and he was appointed by Trump. I would also assume that he had comprehensive access to whatever information existed at the time. During a 2023 CNN interview, Mr. Barr says that there was no evidence of election fraud and that he believes Trump “knew that he lost the election.”
Let’s summarize the findings of these various studies and groups:
Only 475 instances of potential voter fraud were found in the six states that Trump claimed had “millions” of fraudulently casted votes. 475 not millions.
In the 60 court cases filed all across the country claiming election fraud, ALL were found without merit – aka, no election fraud – and the legal team that brought them may be sanctioned by the court for filing frivolous lawsuits.
A consultant hired by the former president to prove that the election was stolen found instead that there was no fraud, and that Joe Biden fairly won the election.
The conservative Cato Institute agreed that Biden fairly won the election and Trump lost.
Bill Barr, Trump’s own appointed Attorney General, said that there was no indication of voter fraud and that he and many others told this to Trump just after the 2020 election.
It appears that Trump was clearly informed by his own experts that he had lost a fair election, and that Joe Biden had won, which I now believe more strongly than I did before I started this project. Yet, Trump is still out there claiming that Joe Biden was not fairly elected! What is up with that? Who does this?
Trump’s inability to accept his 2020 election loss when faced with overwhelming evidence that he lost, raises questions about Trump’s mental processes … not about the election. Like we say here in Chicago, “Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt.”
Please, take a moment to process all of this. Look at the various organizations and people involved. Look at their level of access to credible data. Look at their diverse personal political persuasions. If the election truly was a fraud, how likely is it that they would all come to the same conclusion that Joe Biden won a fair election in 2020. As a researcher, this is a powerful finding. Here is why.
Researchers call this “triangulation” where multiple, independent sources indicate a similar finding. According to Scribbr, “It’s a research strategy that can help you enhance the validity and credibility of your findings and mitigate the presence of any research biases in your work.”9
Just to be clear, Biden won with 51% of the popular vote to Trump’s 47% (a 7 million vote difference). Biden won the electoral college vote with 306 votes to Trump’s 232 votes (a 74 vote difference). Not close, really.
Which brings me to perhaps the most troubling part about all of this. It is reasonable to assume that Trump had access to all of this data and more, and knew that he lost the 2020 election. And yet, he continues to spread what he knows are election lies on the national and international stage. Why would he do this? Let’s see what the experts say about someone who denies reality and continues to lie.
According to the University of Rochester Medical Center, “The main reason people lie is low self-esteem. They want to impress, please, and tell someone what they think they want to hear.” The Cleveland Clinic also sees this as a problem and writes that a person who has “an unshakeable belief in something that’s untrue … and almost everyone else knows this belief to be false” may be suffering from delusional disorder. Wow again! This exercise has just become seriously frightening. What if either or both of these are correct?10
This means that Trump is either a chronic liar purposefully spreading disinformation about the integrity of our democracy, or delusional, or both. Either way, someone at risk of suffering from either of these conditions should never be President of the United States.
The power of the US President is enormous and can shape the future of America and the world. Such power should not be in the hands of a man who may have a mental disorder indicated by the fact that he knows that he lost the election and yet continues to falsely claim he won, consciously lying to achieve his own personal agenda. Donald Trump cannot be trusted in the Oval Office. Period.
Gravity doesn't change direction because I think it should. The lost election doesn't become a win for the guy who lost just because he believes it to be true. He lost and the evidence presented here clearly supports that claim. Trump is dishonest, delusional, or both, to claim otherwise.
As a final note, I did spend quite a bit of time looking for Trump’s own justification for believing he won the election, and found a lot of generalities with few specifics beyond the general claims noted here. He seems to simply believe it, so it must be true, to him anyway.
If after reading all of this you still choose to cast your vote for Trump, that is certainly your right. All I am asking you to do is accept that all of the data indicates that you (all of us) have been consciously lied to in a major way by the very man you intend to make the leader of the most powerful nation in the world.
I believe that character matters in a leader, and Trump fails that test.
Is that what you want your precious vote to stand for?
Thanks for stopping by, and please vote! ☮
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I am not going to talk about the Electoral College for this piece.
If you are into processing lots of data, check out this Pew Research site which offers a ton of details about the 2020 Presidential Election voting demographics. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/06/30/behind-bidens-2020-victory/
In addition, a block of folks will be voting soon who will ONLY vote for someone who believes the election was stolen. If in fact the “stolen” claim that is a lie, then they should know that when casting their precious vote.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/longform/2024/9/12/trumps-false-voter-fraud-claims-set-stage-for-turmoil
Here is the AP report analysis. https://apnews.com/article/voter-fraud-election-2020-joe-biden-donald-trump-7fcb6f134e528fee8237c7601db3328f
Here is the Wikipedia page on the CLC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Campaign_Legal_Center#:~:text=Campaign%20Legal%20Center%20(CLC)%20is,Commission%2C%20is%20CLC's%20founding%20president and here is the CLC page of their analysis: https://campaignlegal.org/results-lawsuits-regarding-2020-elections
Here is the Cato 2023 Annual Report https://www.cato.org/cato-institute-2023-annual-report/message-president-chairman as well as a link to their 2020 Election Investigation report https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aqorZ61AYFqZU-EDQBBzjqfvAoC5nKcB/view.
https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/triangulation/#:~:text=What%20is%20triangulation%20in%20research,and%20credibility%20of%20your%20findings.
https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/encyclopedia/content.aspx?contenttypeid=1&contentid=528
Cleveland Clinic: https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/9599-delusional-disorder
Excellent! Your thesis is well researched logical, and conclusive. I just hope it changes some minds in the Deniers ranks.
Thanks for posting this Ed!
Completely agree with your analysis, Ed. Unfortunately, a huge percentage of the US population continues to support the Orange Monster. I am not anti-conservative, despite being a liberal Berkeley guy. The term "conservative" should not be applied to his supporters or to him.