Trump reinvents rigged election myth around Twitter allegations

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Former President Donald Trump is back to leading Republicans in shouting voter fraud, but what he’s referring to has almost entirely changed.

When Trump suggested in an online message earlier this month that the Constitution could be terminated to redo the 2020 election or declare him a winner, the UNPRECEDENTED FRAUD that he said required this UNPRECEDENTED REMEDY was no longer. a conspiracy involving counterfeit ballots or sabotaged voting machines. . These claims have been completely debunked in audits, litigation and external reviews.

Instead, Trump was now advancing a new theory about how the election was stolen from him: a supposed scheme between social media companies, the FBI and Democrats to suppress information that could have helped Trump’s campaign. . The claim is fueled in part by new Twitter owner Elon Musks’ decision to release internal documents about the platforms’ brief deletion of a 2020 story about then-candidate Joe Bidens’ son. , while this could be the result of disinformation efforts.

The biggest thing to come out of the Twitter targeting hoax is that the presidential election was rigged and that’s as big as it gets!!! Trump said in another post on his Truth Social platform on Dec. 9.

This new twist quickly won support from many Republicans and right-wing media sources. The reinforcements come at a critical time for Trump as he attempts a political comeback amid growing isolation from other party leaders. Several recent surveys show Trump trailing Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis in the first presidential primary.

Many Republicans have faulted Trump for dragging down party midterm election results with a focus on election denial, and his 2024 campaign announcement speech on Nov. 15 clearly lacked his usual false claims of fraud in the 2020 election results. But now, taking advantage of recent Twitter revelations, Trump is battling again in 2020. And though some Republican leaders have denounced the suggestion to suspend the Constitution, many Republicans are joined Trump in demanding investigations into the Twitter controversy or alleging election manipulation.

The reason it’s happening right now is that they’ve suffered defeats and there’s like a crisis where many people are turning away from Trump and dividing the movement, said Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a historian at New York University and author of Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present. Think of how much he and others have invested in indoctrinating people with this rigged election language. You can’t give up everything. You have to keep the conspiracy mentality.

Trump spokesman Steven Cheung highlighted the new theme in a statement. President Trump has proven himself right time and time again, and the latest revelations about how woke liberals on Twitter meddled in an election and deleted important information is further proof that Big Tech has put thumbs up in favor of Democrats, he said. If they can do that to President Trump, imagine what they do to ordinary Americans.

Even before Musk began publishing company communications this month, social media censorship complaints had become a staple of Trump’s repertoire. At midterm rallies, Trump repeatedly claimed that Twitter’s removal of the New York Post article about Hunter Bidens’ laptop cost him 17 points at the polls. It was unclear where he got that estimate from.

Other Republicans were also turning to emphasize social media. During a debate during a U.S. Senate race in Arizona, Republican candidate Blake Masters proposed amending his earlier proclamation that I believe Trump won in 2020 by acknowledging that he had not seen evidence of vote tampering, but claimed the feds forced social media companies to block information that would have helped Trump win. At that time, Trump objected to this reframing.

I heard you did a good job in the debate, but a poor campaign response, Trump told Masters in a phone call that was recorded and released as part of a Fox News documentary. Trump added, you have to go harder on this one thing.

Now, however, Trump himself has pivoted to make much the same point. The theme gained traction from an August podcast interview in which Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the FBI tipped off Facebook officials about the Russian propaganda, but didn’t recall not if he specifically mentioned the Hunter Biden story.

Additionally, a lawsuit filed by the Republican attorneys general of Missouri and Louisiana alleging that government officials colluded with tech companies to censor social media has generated depositions, including that of an FBI agent who coordinated regular meetings with social media companies on election disinformation. The agent said Hunter Biden’s story was not discussed.

In recently released Twitter documents, some company officials expressed caution or uncertainty about whether the laptop story violated Twitter’s policy against pirated content. Although some of the information on the laptop has since been authenticated, how it was obtained remains unclear.

Congressional Republicans, including the new chairs of the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees, are now calling for an investigation into Twitter’s handling of the Hunter Biden story as part of broader investigations into alleged politicization in the FBI and the business dealings of the President’s sons. House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy, who is trying to shore up the conferences right flank to win the speakers’ gavel, has pledged to subpoena former intelligence officials who signed a public letter warning that the Hunter Biden’s story had all the classic hallmarks of a Russian information operation. .

I think there are all kinds of questions that need to be answered, and we’re committed to getting there, said Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who is set to lead the Judiciary Committee, during a a press conference in November. We know that had an impact on the elections.

Jordan referenced surveys where thousands and thousands of voters across the country say it could have impacted their decision in the 2020 election. His spokesperson provided a poll by a holding of right published in the Daily Mail, a British tabloid, saying that more than half of the 501 adults who followed the story said knowing the material was real and not misinformation would have likely changed their vote.

Another investigation conducted shortly after the election by a right-wing organization claimed that full knowledge of the Hunter Biden scandal would have overturned the Electoral College. The group posed the question in a way that misrepresented the facts of the case.

Despite Twitter’s actions, the Hunter Biden story was well publicized ahead of the election, as evidenced by Google search traffic. Trump also raised the claims in the first debate, seen by an estimated 73.1 million people.

The Trump campaign has sent fundraising emails with subject lines such as FRAUD asking supporters, Have you seen the BIG story on Twitter and various forms of government fraud, particularly voter fraud? The campaign also promoted articles from Fox News, the New York Post and other right-wing outlets emphasizing Twitter, the FBI and the Hunter Biden story.

The last election was influenced by the FBI, Fox News host Tucker Carlson said during a Dec. 7 prime-time appearance. If this happened in another country, in a third world country, the State Department would declare the election illegitimate, because it would have been absolute interference in the election.

In a video ad posted to the New York Post on Thursday, Trump said that as president he would issue an executive order prohibiting federal agencies from colluding with companies to censor Americans or brand national speech as disinformation or disinformation. , and would eliminate every federal bureaucrat who directly or indirectly has national censorship.

No evidence emerged that the federal government, which was led by Trump at the time, controlled what social media companies allowed to air. During weekly consultations with Twitter, federal law enforcement has warned that foreign countries may attempt to hack people involved in political campaigns and spread harmful information on social media, according to a statement from a senior law enforcement official. Twitter in connection with the company’s defense of a Federal Election Commission complaint. The official (whom Musk has since fired) said he learned from those meetings that there were rumors of a hack and leak operation involving Hunter Biden before the New York Posts article was published.

Twitter was just a tool in the hands of the Deep State to attack President Trump and do whatever it can to prevent President Trump’s re-election, senior Trump campaign adviser Boris Epshteyn said in a statement. recent interview on former White House strategist Stephen K. Bannons podcast. The crime is the theft of the 2020 election from President Donald J. Trump.

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