The election data hints at massive GOP fraud
Calm down, I don’t think the GOP committed any election fraud. Instead, I’m going to show that if you were going to look at the data and draw inferences about possible fraud, there’d be all sorts of red flags pointing right at the GOP.
Let’s start with the basics. AFAIK everyone admits that fraud is likely to be concentrated in swing states, where moving 100,000 votes might tip a close election. The wide national vote margin, which will likely be around 7 million in favor of Biden, has nothing to do with fraud.
So to look for evidence of fraud you’d look for swing states where Trump did suspiciously well given the fact that he lost the national vote by a huge margin.
The last estimate I saw from Nate Silver is that Biden will win the national vote by 4.6%, and he’s winning the tipping point state (Wisconsin) by 0.6%. That means Trump is outperforming by an astounding 4% in the tipping point state, a huge gap unlike anything I’ve ever seen. (Even the last election saw an unprecedented gap, but it was more like 2.9%. And in 2012, Obama won the tipping point state by 5.4%, even as he won the election by only 3.9%)
Trump is perhaps the luckiest presidential candidate in US history, massively outperforming his national margin in all the key swing states. That’s really, really, really suspicious!
Of course I don’t actually believe that Trump tried to steal the election, because all the experts (including Republican experts like Karl Rove) say it’s virtually impossible to steal an election when the swing states are being won by tens of thousands of votes. Even stealing one of those states would be almost impossible. Three would be almost impossible to the third power. There’s really no point in even trying to steal an election.
I frequently see election fraud claims based on what the Trumpistas view as “fishy election data”. I cannot emphasize enough that all of these claims are false. Whether it be false claims that lots of people only voted for Biden and not for someone else, or false claims of suspicious margins in big Democratic cities, or false claims of a suspiciously high turnout in states like Wisconsin, it’s all lies. I’ve chased every claim down the rabbit hole and they’ve all been lies.
If you actually wished to look for suspicious patterns in the data, the evidence would point overwhelmingly at the GOP, not the Dems. Given Biden’s 7 million vote margin, it’s insane how close Trump came to winning last week’s election. It really does look like the GOP cheated, padding vote totals in swing states, if suspicious election data is your criterion.
Over at Econlog I pointed out how “weird” it is that there’s a high correlation between favoring a losing candidate and believing election fraud took place. One is a normative judgement and one is positive. Why any correlation at all? It’s not rational. In a logical world, the Dems would be the ones screaming about election fraud.
PS. BTW, can we count the &%$*@&$ votes! There are still many millions of votes yet to be counted. The media is full of stories based on “vote margins” which will change once all the votes are counted. It’s been ten days since the election and vote counting is not speeding up; indeed it’s slowing down more and more each day. What’s the problem? If all the votes had been counted within 24 hours, it would have been immediately clear that Biden had won the national vote by a comfortable margin and won the EC by at least three sizable states.
Update: I just realized that Biden will win the EC by 306 to 232, the exact same “landslide” that Trump claimed in 2016. In addition, Trump has implicitly acknowledged that he lost the election, with all his tweets about control of the Senate hanging in the balance in Georgia. So that means Trump now thinks he lost the 2020 election by a landslide.
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13. November 2020 at 11:03
From the NYT in 2012:
“There is a bipartisan consensus that voting by mail, whatever its impact, is more easily abused than other forms.”
“On the most basic level, absentee voting replaces the oversight that exists at polling places with something akin to an honor system.”
“Absentee ballots also make it much easier to buy and sell votes. In recent years, courts have invalidated mayoral elections in Illinois and Indiana because of fraudulent absentee ballots.”
Biden (aka Kamala) probably won, not that I care one way or the other so long as we maintain a shred of precious gridlock, but the volte face of the NYT on the subject (in 2012, the big worry was GOP mail-in shenanigans) is deliciously predictable.
13. November 2020 at 11:54
Brian, So perhaps the GOP did engage in massive voter fraud?
13. November 2020 at 11:56
Seriously, Election fraud is incredibly easy to do, I could have mailed in my wife’s ballot while she was in China. What’s hard is election fraud moving tens of thousands of votes. That’s basically impossible. I wouldn’t even know where to begin, and no one else seems to know either.
13. November 2020 at 12:04
As the Heritage Foundation’s election expert Hans von Spakovsky has explained, mail-in voting is the “single worst form of election possible” because “it moves the entire election beyond the oversight of election officials.”
Does not prove anything—although they sure tried pretty hard to make sure they got it.
13. November 2020 at 12:14
subtract the CA total first, which negates the entirety of Biden’s margin, then do your math
13. November 2020 at 12:19
BTW, were you being sarcastic? Of course losers worry about voter fraud more——why would the winner ever care?—-You don’t really think if Biden lost by these same amounts they would not be doing the same thing, do you? Impossible. Was I the only one saying once the mail in vote became universal—whoever lost would challenge the election? It was obvious–even if no cheating happened. It would have been worse—“neo-nazi Trump supporters” for some reason tend to not burn and loot.
13. November 2020 at 12:51
Lots of suspicious movements for Trump. Look at Starr County in Texas where Trump received a 55! Point Swing from 2016. That looks very suspicious to me.
2016:
D H. Clinton 79.1% 9,246
R D. Trump 19.0% 2,218
Hilary +60.1%
2020:
Candidate Total Votes % Votes
Joe Biden 9,099 52.1%
Donald Trump 8,224 47.1%
Biden +5.0%
The difference is 55.1%. This is in a Hispanic county in Red Texas. Isn’t suspicious how Trump went 2,200 votes to 8,200 votes in 4 years while Biden basically got the same number of votes as Hilary? Where did those mysterious 6,000 votes comes from and why did they all go to Trump? My belief is that Red Texas added votes because they were scared that Texas was a swing state in 2020. They did it in the Hispanic South Texas counties because no one pays attention that area. How else can you explain the mysterious Hispanic swing for Trump?
13. November 2020 at 13:22
Scott,
okay this should be the right thread now, sorry for double post. I hope the AI is happy now.
I agree that a targeted effective manipulation of elections is very difficult and unlikely. In a system with the simultaneous counting of all votes without intermediate results it is almost impossible.
In order to significantly increase the risk of a targeted effective election manipulation, two things would be needed:
A divided, highly partisan society in which even moderate libertarian world-class economics professors would stylize the elections as an apocalyptic battle of Good vs. Evil. In such a good vs. evil world, it is the first civic duty of any “good” citizen to count the votes in the “right” way in order to prevent the downfall into barbarism and the end of the world.
In such an ideologically super-charged world, no more orders would have to be given from the very top, the local election authorities and local elections workers would simply know what to do in their “blue” resp. “red” district or state.
And secondly, one would need an ineffective, outdated election system that doesn’t count the votes simultaneously, but over many, many days with many intermediate results, so that close to every idiot can calculate quite accurately how many votes one would need to manipulate.
Thank God both conditions are not met in the US.
P.S. I am not saying that these elections were rigged in a meaningful way. I don’t think so and I don’t believe in that. I’m just saying that if you wanted to rig an election in a certain way in certain regions and states, then the conditions in the US are surprisingly good. The US should really fix that. Unfortunately they won’t.
This system makes it easier for Trump to put on his ridiculous martyr act, which might even resonate with his base and beyond.
13. November 2020 at 13:44
“What’s hard is election fraud moving tens of thousands of votes. That’s basically impossible. I wouldn’t even know where to begin, and no one else seems to know either.”
This individual ‘knows where to begin’?
This is why H.R.C. ‘lost’?
“And it’s deadly. Doubtless, Crosscheck delivered Michigan to Trump who supposedly “won” the state by 10,700 votes. The Secretary of State’s office proudly told me that they were “very aggressive” in removing listed voters before the 2016 election. Kobach, who created the lists for his fellow GOP officials, tagged a whopping 417,147 in Michigan as potential double voters.”
http://www.gregpalast.com/trump-picks-al-capone-vote-rigging-investigate-federal-voter-fraud/
https://www.gregpalast.com/t-r-u-t-h-o-u-ts-marc-ash-interviews-greg-palast/
“In 2016, no fewer than 5,872,857 ballots were cast—and never counted.
Does it matter? In Detroit, 75,355 ballots were never counted because of 87 broken scanning machines. And Trump supposedly won Michigan by 10,700 votes — really?
And, no fewer than 1,982,071 legal voters were denied the right to vote. Told to get the hell out of the polling station. Can you guess their color?
Add it up. That’s at least 7,854,928 legitimate votes and voters tossed out of the count.
So God Bless America. By the way, these numbers are from the raw data supplied to me by the US Elections Assistance Commission.
https://www.gregpalast.com/how-trump-stole-2020-2/
13. November 2020 at 14:23
Mike, Please count all the votes before making false and misleading claims.
Michael, You said:
“Of course losers worry”
You are conflating “worry” with belief. Why don’t Dems believe there was election fraud? Saying “of course people are corrupt” doesn’t actually refute my point, does it?
John, Great example. I like it when the conspiracy buffs both brag about how well Trump did among minorities, and then complain that Trump did implausibly poorly in minority dominated big cities. They can’t even get their story straight!
Christian, So you think Trumpistas at the local level might have tried to rig the election? I doubt that. Even in this environment there aren’t enough corrupt poll workers.
Postkey, Well, it’s certainly refreshing to see the GOP accused of vote fraud.
13. November 2020 at 14:41
@mike:
Thanks for weighing in with the usual “it’s all California” baloney. Biden got more votes in 25 states (+DC).
13. November 2020 at 16:12
“As the Heritage Foundation’s election expert Hans von Spakovsky has explained–” Michael Rulle.
Hans may be correct. But even more importantly, why if someone is named Hans von Spakovsky, they destined to be doctrinaire right-winger?
By the way, the left-wing directorate has announced they are compiling lists of anyone who ever supported Trump, and will now exact economic or social retribution.
I hope you are not using your real name. I just put a BLM poster on my front yard.
13. November 2020 at 16:39
@Ben Cole – you put a BLM poster on your front yard in Thailand? Bold.
@Ssumner – “It’s been ten days since the election and vote counting is not speeding up; indeed it’s slowing down more and more each day. What’s the problem?” – it takes longer to count the final 1% than expected, said an election officer, presumably because the ballots have anomalies like unclear intent (‘hanging chads’) and are set aside.
As Brian Donohue said, and others, fraud is not uncommon with absentee ballots. Not common, but not rare. And gridlock is good. I’m glad Biden won, but I’m also happy I voted for Trump (to keep the politicians honest, so they know it’s a close vote, not a Blue Wave).
PS–in the news today: some AGW models suggest we’ve already reached the point of no return for global warming; in this case Trump is correct, in that since China nor India will reign in their man-made industrial gasses, it’s futile for the USA to handicap their economy by doing so, just so they can ‘feel good’. Better to impose greenhouse gas tariffs on China and India, which I doubt China-loving Joe Biden will do.
13. November 2020 at 16:59
anyone not admitting they are on the grift who quotes, refers to, alludes to or thinks about Nate Silver is on the grift on the grift. So, the folie a deux for sumner has been revealed.
13. November 2020 at 17:47
Does anyone here care to bet against Biden taking office as President in January of next year?
13. November 2020 at 19:08
Ray Lopez: You can’t be too careful. I took a photo of my BLM sign and uploaded to all my social-media pages.
Michael Sandifer: Biden is 77 years old and has had twin brain surgeries removing aneurysms. He appears enfeebled. On the other hand, the actuarial tables say he has about nine years left to live.
But, if I were Biden, I would not want to be left alone in a room with Harris, or to eat or drink something she has prepared.
Perhaps the Secret Service is hip to this.
13. November 2020 at 20:16
When can I vote with my phone? That would solve the hassle, disease, and counting speed problems with voting.
13. November 2020 at 23:33
Christian,
and anyone pondering possible voter fraud in mail-in votes: It’s not just about whether and how many irregularities happened, it’s whether they overwhelmingly favored just one side.
Assuming I know absolutely nothing about the US except that electorate and state legislatures are split roughly 50/50 between the two parties, would make for a strong Bayesian prior of 50/50 even split of benefits from any alleged fraud for either party. Basically the fraud evens out. This holds true for key swing states too, since there too, the election was often controlled by GOP administrations. On the mail-in vote side, again no reason to think that any fraud, if committed, would just be committed by one side.
On the federal level, government and agencies such as US postal systems are controlled by the GOP and this would lead us to a Bayesian prior that fraud, if it occurred, favored the GOP.
So without even any data on actual ballots and how they were counted or handled, I’d conclude that there is a higher probability that fraud, if it occurred at all, was favoring the GOP candidate.
Note, it’s not enough to suggest that a country is polarized and that processes are not optimal for fraud to occur or to matter. Fraud also has to be shown to favor one specific side, or it evens out. In a country split roughly 50/50, that’s not the case.
14. November 2020 at 00:54
Dr. Shiva Ayyadurai, of MIT, has already explained this. How Sumner reaches the opposite conclusion of Dr. Shiva, without any evidence at all, should be concerning for serious academics.
Considering Dr. Shiva is an inventor, innovator, and world class Academic while Sumner teaches at a school nobody has ever heard of, I think we all know who is more capable of analyzing data.
I recently come up with another theory to describe Sumner’s weird and incoherent rants:
1. undisclosed financial interests with the CCP (his wife is Chinese).
2. He is an idiot.
For our sake, I do hope its the latter.
14. November 2020 at 05:30
@Xu
I did see the Dr Shiva presentation. At its most superficial level, it seemed to make sense. He was basically saying a reasonable hypothesis was that “Republicans against Trump” in adjacent precincts should be a similar percentage and “normally distributed” around the mean. What he seemed to show, was that the higher the percent of Republicans in a precinct, the higher the percent of them were against him in a linear increasing fashion. However, while that clearly makes less sense, I was not persuaded he was showing all information required. I felt like I was a Spanish Card magician (Spaniards are the greatest card and coin magicians). I will be looking at it more closely.
14. November 2020 at 06:21
@Christian List
I too assume willingness to cheat is equally spread. But the opportunity to cheat is not. My Bayesian prior on cheating, is the group that wants a voting method which is much more difficult to control the counts has a greater opportunity if they have run cities for decades and if the voting method is untried. I recall listening to the Washington State official giving an interview on NPR in October saying it took “about 5 years” to get it right. And no, NPR did not follow up on specifics—-which I laughed about.
One thing was clear in NJ. We all received unsolicited ballots. There is a convenience factor. However, in NJ, a third person was allowed to deliver one’s ballot—-as long as they signed it as the 3rd person—-and the voter also signed it. I compared this to the way we voted for the rest of my life. I walk into a voting precinct. I sign a book which is compared to past signatures by a human. I press some buttons—-and have faith the buttons I press are accurate. All in real time.
I delivered my wife’s ballot this year. No one checked anyone’s signature. I dropped it into a drop box and had to squeeze it in the box it was so stuffed. So my vote was disconnected in time and space from both the verification process and the counting process and delayed by an unknown period. This was new.
It is easy to imagine two cheating methods—-one likely not illegal, and one likely illegal. In NJ at least, it was well known that both parties had what was called “walking around money”—-forever. It is just what it sounds like—-you find random people, pay them, take them to the polls and they vote. Except for the money, that is legal—and it was always done. When Whitman won the Governorship, her campaign manager, Ed Rollins, bragged openly about how superior his walking around campaign was—-denying payoffs of course.
Well, it is much easier now. Go to densely populated areas with low voting turnout, knock on doors, and the voter never needs to leave their house—-and harvest votes. Without paying this is legal. Should it be? Of course not—-But it is.
But this is described for back drop information. The home run is somehow getting large batches of ballots—-like counterfeit money—- controlled by a few operatives. This could and was done forever too—-except the process is easier now. Further, ignoring rules on counting —-etc.
Why would GOP be against mail-in voting? Because if you rely on the voting booth they are more likely to win. The Dems insist, minorities are less able to vote in person. Why? Their answers are racist and absurd. No cars, no ids, no credit cards, no knowledge of how to register.
If there were ever a year a mass fraud could occur, this would be the one. Trump seems resigned he lost—-but he should not let this year go uncontested—-nor should have Biden if he lost
14. November 2020 at 07:59
@Ben Cole
While I assume you are half joking on BLM signs, I assume you are half serious too—and I agree.
There are too many people I know well, who say they cannot be friends with people who voted for Trump. While the opposite may also be true , I have never heard it said.
I will use my family as an example. My wife and I raised 3 of our own children, we also helped raise a godson who is considered a brother as he lived with us with his parents since birth (he is 23). He lives in Brooklyn near our youngest daughter. We were also guardian for my nephew, who is also considered a brother by the other siblings and vice versa. 2 of the 5 are what America calls Hispanic, 3 of the 5 are half Hispanic.Paid for private school and college—-none have debt. I am blessed. Have 5 grand kids.
I am a microcosm. Just to give you my values on politics. I never tried or thought I should try to persuade what my children should believe—-Why? Each person will find their own way.
4 of the five are Trump haters. Hate being the operative word for 3 of the 4. 2 of the 4 do not let it impact their relationships. 2 do. The one pro Trump sibling will not discuss politics with them as it ends in disaster.
My wife grew up impoverished in Cuba. She had 8 siblings, 5 born in Cuba. She was 8. In October of 1963, when her family and some friends literally escaped. 19 people on a 22 foot boat . They got caught in Hurricane Ginny. Were seen by a cruise ship and rescued and were taken to Puerto Rico—-the story is unreal.
Last week our Godson told my wife, his “second mother by his account”, that since she voted for Trump he cannot have a relationship with her anymore. Her philosophy has always been, “what I care about is you have the right to vote for who you want to”.
His reason is because Trump hates his parents ——a non sequitur. We worked with immigration from day 1—under Bush his mother became legal. His father, under Obama, could not—-although we are still openly in the system, trying to,make it happen. We provide health insurance of course. They pay taxes, we/they pay social security—no hiding at all—-they live in a 2000 square foot apartment in our house and of course my Godson has full access to,the house—parents prefer to hang out in their apartment while,they,have full,access. They speak,Spanish primarily and my wife considers them her closest friends .No,one is hunting the father down—-not even close. My wife hangs with them mostly.
Yet, Godson said what he said. A college graduate and an actor who works to support himself—completely. One thing we have done for 2 of the kids is be a guarantor their rental appts in Brooklyn—-my godson and youngest daughter
My oldest daughter in many ways is the most stereotypical anti-Trumper. Magna Cum Laude from NYU, MBA from Duke, married to a real estate guy—(I have no idea what his politics are!)—-funded by a billionaire—-and what I can say is he has 25 employees and they are really doing well.
So, she too hates Trump. I could care less. My wife was speaking with her recently and said, whoever wins in the end I will support—-as valid and legitimate—-. Again, her view is we have the right to vote. My daughter finds that outrageous. She has not and will not except Trump as legitimate. She believes every trope about him. Fine. But, she has anger toward her (me too—-but I will not engage.
In this area, she is like the most bizarre of the CNN hosts. But I do not care —-what I find horrorfying is her dislike of persons who vote for Trump. She still,is a loving daughter.
But in my lifetime, I do not recall this before. As Scott Adams says, if he really is that bad it would be immoral not to cheat. The left is the worst it has ever been
My nephew is anti Trump but he likes to engage with out anger. My sisters kids hate Trump but they do not transfer that to,me.
Just a story
14. November 2020 at 09:03
Trump’s nightmare future is that the citizenry ignores him.
Let’s start now.
14. November 2020 at 09:05
Msgkings, Yeah, Biden would easily win the popular vote even without California. There are many more votes to be counted on the East Coast.
14. November 2020 at 15:40
m. rulle: get thee to an editor who appreciates the soul within brevity. you drone.
14. November 2020 at 16:35
Lin Wood and Sidney Powell have made some strong statements related to the Dominion computer system. I don’t know anything about Dominion but if the computers counting the votes are questionable then we should count the votes by hand just to be sure. Computers can change millions of votes in milliseconds!
14. November 2020 at 18:13
M Rulle: I enjoyed your story. I cannot fathom such hysterics regarding politics (this blog had its TDS moments too). Jeez, what would your family members do if they learned the truth about Xi Jinping?
People in America are unhappy. Much of it has to do with declining living standards.
Oddly, Biden is a corporatist-globalist, with intended results likely to be more damaging to average working people than Trump’s.
The Apples, BlackRocks, WalMarts are just delighted to see public anger directed at local police departments and racism and not corporatism-globalism, with its attendant and hugely expensive military-industrial-intelligence complex.
Biden waves a BLM flag and but generally pursues the Bush-Clinton agenda, as defined by Wall Street, Hollywood, and Silicon Valley.
Side story: There is something called the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement, financed by China money. Inaugural ceremonies features a representative of Beijing. The name is self-parody, no? America should be globally engaged. Very Olympian, cosmopolitan, with those unlimited horizons and vistas. No mean, small ideas here.
And Detroit, on the ground? The $3,000-a-month apartments in L.A.? Grubby little topics, for peons with small minds.
From the Penn Bidens website:
“Even as Americans remain committed to the ideals of democracy, a majority see democracy in the United States as weak and getting weaker, according to a national survey jointly commissioned by Freedom House, the George W. Bush Institute, and the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement.”
Yes, the George W. Bush Institute and the Biden Center holding hands. Advancing democracy! (Not in China, but….).
But, as you say, I can’t seem to work up emotion towards Biden, or his supporters. Biden strikes me as one of the lesser lights on Gilligan’s Island.
Trump was not likable either, but I agreed with the thrust of some of his policies. We will see on Biden.
Good luck to you and your family. Maybe they will learn that family trumps politics. I hope so.
15. November 2020 at 02:34
Am I the only one who thinks election-deciding fraud is less important the closer the election ? Honestly if it’s within a few thousand votes in a few states who even cares?
There’s no evidence of fraud but even if there were if it’s that close I don’t really see the difference
15. November 2020 at 07:16
Scott, your addendum makes a mistake I’d thought you more than anyone else would have been long over: assuming that Trump has a coherent position and that his utterances give clues about it.
15. November 2020 at 07:56
Skeptical, If you are saying that no one really knows who won a close election like 2000, so they might as well flip a coin, then I agree.
Fortunately Biden won by 7 million, and 147,000 in Michigan, so I’m not going to lose sleep over a handful of questionable votes in Detroit, where Trump actually did a bit better among black voters than usual.
Matthias, Yeah, I’m just trolling.
15. November 2020 at 23:06
Xu,
That analysis is mostly wrong. You can’t subtract percentages from different sized groups. I’m dong a deep dive on this subject, and my preliminary conclusion is the conspiracies are very misleading at best.
However, I do think Dr. Shiva is correct in his claim that our elections are unverifiable. Our vote counting machines to not use open source software. I repeat, we do not have access to the source code used to count our votes. This is beyond unacceptable.
16. November 2020 at 08:31
Scott,
Poll workers are just human beings, they can be quite idelogical. But you are right, I don’t think it works like that on a large scale. The smartest way to do fraud is to use a method where you put many forged ballots into the hands of honest poll workers, similar to money laundering.
The problem is that fraud is not effective if you live in the back of beyond and are tied to your low population numbers. Relevant fraud is only possible in large corrupt cities, let’s say Chicago until the 1960s.
mbka,
That’s right, I haven’t thought of that yet, especially because they do so poorly in the absentee voting. I also think that the voting system, like many systems in the US, is very federal. Probably the federal government doesn’t have much influence in the states, so the blue and red states control themselves, the same at the county level. But as I said, Team Red would have to fake more systematically because their population density is so much lower.
If you project the election results of the counties on the map of the US, the whole area is red, interrupted by blue dots and blue lines, the areas with high population density. Quite impressive. So in theory the GOP would need to forge in many, many counties at the same time.
16. November 2020 at 10:10
agrippa—-I have never read anything you wrote—I did see my name as I was scrolling so I stopped to read it. Thank you- I agree am an over writer—too lazy to edit. I do try from time to time.
Having said that—-why do you use that pseudonym?—- I always thought of him as the Fredo of the family. Although a combo of Santino and Fredo is more accurate.
17. November 2020 at 10:37
@ Ben Cole
What a nice and instructive response—I really appreciate it—-thank you.
Mike