ChiGoose

Pretty big “if” there. I am extremely skeptical that this is what they actually want to achieve. Besides, we have an existing role for that kind of activity in the inspectors general.

The name of the department is literally a money making scheme for a guy who holds a lot of Doge Coin.

Nah, a bad faith argument is constantly mischaracterizing someone’s stance because it doesn’t fit your narrative and then making a bunch of claims based purely on conjecture. You know, the thing you’re doing.

ITT: People who believe in ridiculous election fraud conspiracies making fun of different people who believe in ridiculous election fraud conspiracies.

No, my point is simply that I do not believe we should disenfranchise voters based on lies of widespread voter fraud. I also don’t know where the claim that “we are finding cheaters much more readily in ID states vs non ID states“ came from. Do you have any support for that idea? The example you provided is people in a non-ID state being caught. Finally, to actually steal a presidential election with the current voter laws would involve such an incredibly large conspiracy of agents across dozens of districts in a multitude of states, all with the voter information and signatures of tens or hundreds of thousands of voters who they are sure will not vote themselves that it is essentially impossible. Any such attempt would not only be doomed to fail but be discovered well in advance of being attempted.

In theory, I really don’t have an issue with an ID requirement. In practicality though, the ID laws are often crafted in ways to make it more challenging for certain groups to vote. I know it’s hard to believe at first, but millions of Americans do not currently have government issued photo IDs. Simply requiring such an ID today without addressing that gap or making it easier for people to obtain a qualifying ID is just needlessly disenfranchising people. Many of the ID laws pushed around by those making false claims of voter fraud limit the types of IDs that qualify to the exclusion of “undesired” voters. For instance, allowing a hunting license but not allowing a student ID from a state school. I believe Alabama passed a voter ID law and then subsequently closed a bunch of DMVs in predominantly black counties. When I look at the types of ID laws being pushed that make it harder for eligible citizens to vote, against the very insignificant amount of fraud, I’m going to stand on the side of the franchise. If widespread voter fraud was actually real, I might think differently. If there was a proposed law that required ID but made it very easy and free for eligible voters to obtain one (combined with a campaign to get people the IDs), I wouldn’t be up in arms against that. PS: if you want to talk about cheating, a lot of the people getting caught for in-person voter fraud are actually Republicans.

Well, now you’re just making stuff up. Also, when did I argue that voter ID was racist?

I am adamant in the point that voter fraud is so rare and so statistically insignificant, that it did not impact the 2020 election. That's supported by every study and analysis conducted on voter fraud. In response, you point to an example of people who did not impersonate other voters to change votes. Instead, they are charged with collecting ballots filled out by the actual voters in a state in which that is not illegal, as well as other unsavory actions that do not amount to the in-person voter fraud that gets bandied about here. They did not go to a polling place and pretend to be another voter. They did not steal ballots and fill them out. They were present when others were filling out ballots, which is definitely bad, but from the story you posted, the voters themselves were the ones filling out the ballots. I was wrong in saying that the election was going to be close? Trump's going to win by about 2% of the popular vote and it looks like it'll end up being about 150,000-250,000 votes across a handful of states that will have decided the electoral college in an election with at least 145,000,000 votes. Seems like expecting a close election was correct to me...

As I said, with hundreds of millions of ballots being cast, it is impossible to eliminate all fraud. However, the rate of voter fraud is so astronomically low that it cannot tip a presidential election. It just can't. Now matter how much people want to think 2020 was rigged, it wasn't. You can point to an instance where people are being prosecuted for mishandling ballots (but notably, not impersonating voters), but the evidence is still overwhelmingly against you. PBS: Exhaustive fact check finds little evidence of voter fraud, but 2020’s ‘Big Lie’ lives on "AP Reporters went looking for cases of voter fraud in six states that Trump has challenged, and they found fewer than 475 potential instances out of more than 25 million votes cast, a number that would not have come close to changing the outcome." 475 is the number of *potential* instances (meaning the actual number is likely lower) and is just 0.0019% of the votes studies Brennan Center: Debunking the Voter Fraud Myth The [The Truth About Voter Fraud] report reviewed elections that had been meticulously studied for voter fraud, and found incident rates between 0.0003 percent and 0.0025 percent. Given this tiny incident rate for voter impersonation fraud, it is more likely, the report noted, that an American “will be struck by lightning than that he will impersonate another voter at the polls.” A comprehensive 2014 study published in The Washington Post found 31 credible instances of impersonation fraud from 2000 to 2014, out of more than 1 billion ballots cast. Even this tiny number is likely inflated, as the study’s author counted not just prosecutions or convictions, but any and all credible claims. Two studies done at Arizona State University, one in 2012 and another in 2016, found similarly negligible rates of impersonation fraud. The project found 10 cases of voter impersonation fraud nationwide from 2000–2012. The follow-up study, which looked for fraud specifically in states where politicians have argued that fraud is a pernicious problem, found zero successful prosecutions for impersonation fraud in five states from 2012–2016. Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, a longtime proponent of voter suppression efforts, argued before state lawmakers that his office needed special power to prosecute voter fraud, because he knew of 100 such cases in his state. After being granted these powers, he has brought six such cases, of which only four have been successful. The secretary has also testified about his review of 84 million votes cast in 22 states, which yielded 14 instances of fraud referred for prosecution, which amounts to a 0.000017 percent fraud rate. A specialized United States Department of Justice unit formed with the goal of finding instances of federal election fraud examined the 2002 and 2004 federal elections, and were able to prove that 0.00000013 percent of ballots cast were fraudulent. There was no evidence that any of these incidents involved in-person impersonation fraud. Over a five year period, they found “no concerted effort to tilt the election.” In 2012, Florida Governor Rick Scott initiated an effort to remove non-citizen registrants from the state’s rolls. The state’s list of 182,000 alleged non-citizen registrants quickly dwindled to 198. Even this amended list contained many false positives, such as a WWII veteran born in Brooklyn. In the end, only 85 non-citizen registrants were identified and only one was convicted of fraud, out of a total of 12 million registered voters. In Iowa, a multi-year investigation into fraud led to just 27 prosecutions out of 1.6 million ballots cast. In 2014 the state issued a report on the investigation citing only six prosecutions. Columbia University Study At the federal level, records show that only 24 people were convicted of or pleaded guilty to illegal voting between 2002 and 2005, an average of eight people a year. The available state-level evidence of voter fraud, culled from interviews, reviews of newspaper coverage and court proceedings, while not definitive, is also negligible. Most voter fraud allegations turn out to be something other than fraud. A review of news stories over a recent two year period found that reports of voter fraud were most often limited to local races and individual acts and fell into three categories: unsubstantiated or false claims by the loser of a close race, mischief and administrative or voter error.

I had to when I registered to vote.

Yeah, and there’s probably somebody in the UP that saw Bigfoot. I never said it never happens. The numbers are just absurdly small (maybe a dozen out of over a hundred million votes). But bad faith actors make a lot of noise, lying about how common it is and people who don’t understand how voting works fall for it when it makes them feel good.

Probably about as many as saw Bigfoot

This is just nonsense peddled by those who don’t understand how things work. In-person voter fraud is statistically non-existent. You’re talking a handful of cases. If neither Kris Kobach nor the Heritage Foundation could find evidence of widespread voter fraud, that should tell you that it’s not a thing. It’s essentially impossible to shut down a bad faith argument that is not based in reality. It’s basically like saying “we could shut down arguments that Bigfoot exists if only we did X.”

The idea that 2024 was stolen is as stupid as the idea that 2020 was stolen is as stupid as the idea that 2016 was stolen. Plenty of stupid to go around.

Was the ABC whistleblower hiding all of the Harris votes?

A different view won’t change the fact that a prosecution will almost certainly fail. It may just change the calculus of whether or not charging someone who you will not convict is worth the political win. If the Dems were looking to use the law to end Trump, they would have indicted him for the crimes Mueller identified that he had committed. The fact that they didn’t should tell you something. There is a yawning gap between what was actually happening with the Trump prosecutions and what the public understands about them.

If you mishandle classified documents you have access to as part of your job, you can be punished by your employer and even fired. But people don’t get charged with a crime unless the prosecutors believe they can prove intent to a jury. And mere possession is not sufficient to establish intent. This really isn’t as hard or complicated as you seem to think it is.

Looking forward to a sudden and miraculous economic recovery on Jan 21.

Your solution for perceived political prosecution is to do *actual* political prosecution? Also, I think Trump would be pretty upset if all of the special counsel materials were made public. It would certainly be pretty bad for him and also set a bad precedent. But I would be lying if I didn't say there's a part of me that wouldn't mind seeing it happen.

I don't see how anything changes regarding the likelihood of success in prosecuting Biden. A new AG may think it's worth prosecuting anyway, but they would almost certainly lose. Just a waste of taxpayer money. As much as I'd love Jack Smith to make all of the evidence and documents public, it would go against practice and also be bad for Trump. Usually, at the end of a Special Counsel investigation, they submit a report. I'm not sure how that even plays out under these circumstances.

She’s likely going to finish closer to Biden than Obama when the counting is done. They raided people’s homes and sent them to jail for doing crimes. You’re free to ask dumb questions and believe in conspiracies. You’re not free to do crimes.

…the story names the people, bud. Reading is fundamental, but I guess only for some.

You guys really will believe anything, huh? 2020 was not stolen. GOP has had poll watchers in every election.

What? No way! Who could have known!? I’m sure a lot of people in this thread feel pretty silly right now…