LIES AND THE LYING LIARS THAT TELL THEM
A Flailing Trump Pushes Questionable Voter Numbers
President Trump, still looking for a narrative after his disastrous government shutdown did immeasurable damage to the country, took to Twitter to share some numbers he believes about voter fraud.
In a move similar to his 2016 voter fraud claims, he once again argued about non-citizens voting. While Trump won in 2018, he lost the popular vote — and Trump tried to claim that was only due to voter fraud suppressing his numbers.
The GOP also suffered tremendous loses in the 2018 midterms.
58,000 non-citizens voted in Texas, with 95,000 non-citizens registered to vote. These numbers are just the tip of the iceberg. All over the country, especially in California, voter fraud is rampant. Must be stopped. Strong voter ID! @foxandfriends
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 27, 2019
A study by a Loyola Law School professor, Justin Levitt, tracked United States elections from 2000-2014. Out of more than 1 billion votes, they could only confirm 31 instances of voter fraud. Additionally, only four documented cases of voter fraud were discovered in 2016.
President Trump’s own commission on voting fraud shut down last January, after finding no evidence of widespread voter fraud.
Trump’s source for his numbers was a tweet by Ken Paxton, the current Texas Attorney General. He retweeted Paxton’s claim as well.
VOTER FRAUD ALERT: The @TXsecofstate discovered approx 95,000 individuals identified by DPS as non-U.S. citizens have a matching voter registration record in TX, approx 58,000 of whom have voted in TX elections. Any illegal vote deprives Americans of their voice.
— Ken Paxton (@KenPaxtonTX) January 25, 2019
The numbers Paxton are citing are suspect. For one, they cover a 22-year time period from 1996 to 2018. There remains, however, no evidence that any of these people voted fraudulently in the 2018 midterms.
What’s more, the data does not state that 58,000 non-citizens voted: these were emphasized as weak matches, with many of those listed being in the process of becoming naturalized citizens.
Many names in that sample are also likely in error, potentially based on a name match alone, but not the same individual. Even the head of the Texas Association of Elections Administrators, Chris Davis, has requested patience, knowing that these number lack appropriate verification. Nevertheless, President Trump moved forward on these claims.
President Trump seems to be once again trying to create a narrative of voter fraud, akin to his post-2016 mantra that “millions” voted illegally in California, in spite of a clear lack of proof.
Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr and a CC license
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