/news/ — Trump Previews Fall Strategy With Baseless Claims of California Vote Fraud

He has been anything but subtle about his desire to limit the ability of Democrats to vote by mail, implying, with no evidence, that simply choosing that widely used means of casting a ballot is inherently suspect. Addressing a gathering of Republican lawmakers in March, he said the way to hold their majority was to pass a strict voter identification law cracking down on mail ballots.

“It’ll guarantee the midterms,” he told them, warning that failure would bring “big trouble.”

Privately, according to one senior adviser, he has pressed aides to find ways to “stop them stealing it from us.”

What is striking so far is how little of this has survived contact with reality. Voting legislation he has championed, the SAVE Act, cleared the House but stalled in the Senate, where Republicans lack the votes to break a Democratic filibuster. Among other things, the bill would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote and would compel states to share voter rolls with the federal government.

An executive order he signed in March directing the Department of Homeland Security to assemble a federal list of eligible voters and barring the Postal Service from delivering mail ballots to anyone left off it was condemned by election experts as illegal and drew multiple lawsuits.

Still, even if Mr. Trump fails to change election laws or processes, he can sow substantial chaos simply by trying to convince voters that the results were fraudulent.

More than five years after his supporters, fueled by lies about a stolen election, stormed the Capitol to stop the transfer of power, Mr. Trump has tried to recast Jan. 6, 2021, as a day of “peace,” claiming his supporters were led astray by F.B.I. officers in a false-flag operation. He has produced no credible evidence, yet he has pardoned rioters who breached the Capitol and has entertained paying restitution to some of them, over the objections of even some in his own party.

His fraud claims about California could matter especially in November. The House majority rests on a thin margin, with Republicans holding 218 seats to Democrats’ 213. After California voters approved Proposition 50 in November — a constitutional amendment pushed by Gov. Gavin Newsom to permit a redrawing of the state’s congressional map — Democrats have a chance to flip as many as five Republican-held seats, potentially enough to take the chamber.

Many of those seats lie in the same Central Valley and Orange County districts whose ballots take days or weeks to tally. In other words, the races that may decide control of Congress could be counted in precisely the slow way Mr. Trump reflexively calls fraud. Elon Musk has amplified the message, arguing that the combination of no voter ID and mail-in ballots amounts to legalized fraud.

Mr. Trump has leveled the same accusation at California’s governor’s race, in which the Republican Steve Hilton is fighting for the second spot that would set up a November runoff against the Democrat Xavier Becerra.

After complaining about “rigged elections” in his Monday social media post, the president added: “Now they’ll be working on great guy Steve Hilton. Won’t have results for, possibly, TWO WEEKS, according to officials.”

This year, California had an unusually competitive primary election for governor, driving up turnout and raising the stakes of the statewide count. To add to the issue, many Democrats waited to return their mail ballots as the field shifted and as some were concerned that Democrats could get locked out of the top two spots.

Asked whether Mr. Trump had any evidence to support his claims that the California elections were being rigged, Abigail Jackson, a White House spokeswoman, said he was “committed to ensuring that Americans have full confidence in the administration of our elections.” That pledge, she added, is “why millions of Americans sent him back to the White House,” adding that Mr. Trump would implement measures to “secure our elections for generations to come.”

During his losing 2020 campaign, Mr. Trump repeatedly made baseless claims that mail-in voting was rife with fraud. In that election, Democrats, many of whom were strictly adhering to pandemic protocols, were much more likely to vote by mail than Republicans, who tended to prefer to vote in person on Election Day — a partisan divide that persists today. Yet Mr. Trump’s crusade against mail-in votes that year alarmed Republican legislative leaders, who privately tried explaining to him that many of the party’s own voters were older and cast ballots that way.

Several states took days to finish counting mail-in ballots in 2020. In Pennsylvania, Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s share of the vote grew each day, eventually allowing him to overtake Mr. Trump in the state and win the election.

Since 2020, many states have made significant investments to speed up their abilities to count mail-in votes quickly. In California, however, it is still common for it to take days or even weeks before enough votes have been counted for news organizations to declare a winner.

This year’s election in California was primed to create even more of a red mirage effect than normal. Facing late upheaval in the governor’s contest after the departure from the race of Eric Swalwell, a congressman at the time, many Democrats waited until the last minute to return their ballots. That meant that the first ballots to be counted and reported were more Republican than normal, and the ballots reported after Election Day have been even more Democratic than is typical.

Paul Mitchell, vice president of Political Data Inc. in Sacramento and an expert in California voter turnout, said that his firm’s data showed that the share of Democratic voters’ ballots being processed has far outpaced the share of Republican ballots in recent days, and that the distance had widened.

California sends every regular voter a mail ballot that can be returned at their convenience. It gives a weeklong grace period for ballots to arrive as long as they are postmarked by Election Day. The state allows voters registered at old addresses or those not registered at all to fill out provisional ballots that become valid if election officials verify their information and deem them eligible. And it allows voters with mismatched signatures on file to resolve discrepancies once they are detected.

All of those provisions make voting easier for residents in California than in many other states, but they add various checkpoints in the system to ensure security, each of which costs time.

“In California and Los Angeles, we have our election laws written in a way that maximizes participation,” said Mike Sanchez, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County registrar of voters.

Mr. Mitchell, who is a Democratic consultant, said that, paradoxically, the most effective way to speed up California’s count would be to eliminate security protocols, like cutting ballot signature verification or checks on voter registration for provisional voters.

“I don’t think Republicans would want that,” he said.

Other election experts said that California suffered from logistical problems. Each of California’s 58 counties is responsible for running its own election, and many lack sufficient resources to verify mail ballots and count votes quickly. They may not have enough workers, space or machines to process ballots in quick order.

State lawmakers passed at least three bills last year designed to speed up the count, but the changes seemed to have marginal effect, given where things stood on Monday, with only about three-quarters of the ballots counted six days after the election.

The bills shortened the deadline to finish counting most ballots, to 13 days from 30 days. They also allowed election officials to begin processing ballots earlier than before and required slightly more frequent updates of results.

But elections are largely county-funded, and most of California’s counties lack the resources to keep staff on constant rotation, said Kim Alexander, who runs the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation.

“We expect our counties to provide all these services to facilitate elections, and the state and federal governments aren’t paying their fair share of the cost,” she said.

>>1518702 (OP)
The fact that he called it "your election" in that one interview tells you all you need to know.
He views himself as the king with divine right to rule and all those pesky checks and balances and democratic institutions are just annoying roadblocks in the way of him doing whatever the fuck he wants

>>1518706
>>1518702 (OP)
>>1518703
>>1518774
On principle he's right: It's an election where every red vote came from in-person voting. Not any proportion of Republican votes came from mail-in votes. That's statistically impossible.

He's going about it the wrong way, of course. The solution is to poll Republicans and find the ones who voted by mail, even if it was just one, even if there was only a single mail-in ballot that didn't get counted: that's election fraud and he could open an inquiry from that.

Instead he goes on TV and shits his diaper about it and screaming "IMMA INVESTIGATE YOU" like this doesn't make it easier for the people doing it to simply spend a few hundred extra burying the evidence. Worse, now that he's complaining, every single election that has mail-in ballots will have him screaming. So we'll get 5 months of MUHH MAIL IN FRAUD while zero investigations happen because everyone treats it as the whiny old man that he comes off as.

52 lawsuits in 50 states after 2020. Every Single Suit was dismissed due to lack of evidence. Even judges that Trump appointed in his first term dismissed his lawsuits.

>>1518785
>On principle he's right
nope

>>1518785
That’s just not true anyways. It’s a conservative talking point they are projecting all over social media and on Fox News and news max. But facts are Pratt got a bunch of mail in votes.

https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2026/jun/08/tweets/spencer-pratt-ballot-dump-zero-votes-24000/

This is exactly what the OP put in the title of this thread. First they spread lies and say if you deny the lies you are “stupid or corrupt” just like Trump yelled at that reporter when even slightly questioned about the lie.

Then after enough people accept the lie and don’t question it you move forward with disavowing any votes you don’t like and seizing the levers of power, it happened in Hungry with Orban, who Trump openly talks about admiring.

>>1518790
Yep. He was right, it's statistically impossible for all mail-in votes to be specifically for one party. He's just too emotional and is going about this the wrong way.

Having mysterious votes suddenly appear at the 11th hour for one specific candidate is banana republic shit.

>>1518791
'A bunch' isn't 'a proportion.' You would expect to see similar proportions, but instead it was an absurd % for one party.

Also
>politifact
LMAO

>>1518791
>politifact
isn't that the site ran by those literal israeli state actors?

>>1518791
I'm esl shill and this post triggers me

>>1518793
already walking back the 0% huh?
Do you ever tire of being a retard shilling for free?

>>1518795
>>1518796
>Not any proportion of Republican votes came from mail-in votes. That's statistically impossible.
The dahlit who plagues this board hoists himself again by his inability to read second grade English. He then yaps like a monkey and throws his own feces as is customary in his country.

>>1518798
So you don't tire of being a retard shilling for free?
I can pay you an infinite amount more to shill about stuff that matters more, like not being a stupid esl shill repeating easily debunked lies on a low post chan for the amusement of everyone else

>>1518792
>>1518794
>>1518795

So weird to freak out over the link when in the link they directly lay out that Pratt got thousands of votes and link to the LA county websites that show it.

But yea call me names and deny reality in order to keep repeating the lie while knowing it is a lie. But if you don’t look at the clear evidence you can lie to yourself too right?

But yea fuck me for linking a politifact link. What source would you trust? If Fox News reports that Pratt got thousands of mail in votes and that any republican saying otherwise is a liar, would that make you concede the point?

Multiple sources reporting parts maim in votes:
https://bckohan.github.io/lavote_scrape/#/4338/10250

https://theballotbook.com/results/county/Los%20Angeles/los-angeles-city-primary-nominating-election-mayor

https://votes.decisiondeskhq.com/races/681017

https://archive.ph/7G2pH

So continue to seeth and project instead of dealing with reality that you are being manipulated in order to steal power.

>>1518801
they're not being manipulated
they're a self hating brownoid fine with all the racism because they can pretend they're white on the internet

>>1518801
>>1518803
ok but why link politifact when it's been objectively proven to be the work of government-based state actors of Israel? They're literally on their payroll.

This is more retarded than linking pravda.

>>1518813
Why can't you get a real job, or read

>>1518803
Sadly a common and very logical situation.
Fuck Kumar, he'll never be white American or EFL.

>>1518816
You're the one that linked a government based agency known for creating foreign propaganda. I'm asking you, Rahjeet.

>>1518818
There's more than one person who has no respect for you here, esl shill. Please try to become more discerning

>>1518818
I'm gay. So my brain is stupid.
I mean it's mearly the apearance of fraud.
Not like it matters. Ans snce it's CA, you'll never be able to prove it.
And if try to investgate, we'll see you in chains.

>>1518819
Actually, no one is on your side here.

>>1518823
You have such a sad little life

>>1518825
Are you correct, even if true? What do these posts even do for you?
Is this just a "I must have the last word post?"
If so, have it. You need it since you have nothing else.

>>1518827
I enjoy belittling you because you deserve it, esl shill. It's very simple

>>1518785
In an election where a Democrat mayor won in a district of Florida which includes Mar-a-Lago, Trump voted via mail-in ballot.
>it's not only Trump who whined about mail-in ballots
The duality of the hypocrites

>>1518785
Do you think him telling all of his supporters that mail in voting is fraud and nobody should do it had anything to do with them not using mail in voting?