Trump's Voter Fraud Claims

Back during the election process Donald Trump brought this up, and my Facebook friends who supported him started beating me over the head with this study from the PEW Research Center. Why? Because despite being a Republican, I reject the notion of widespread voter fraud. So Trump brings up the conclusion of this study, and it starts a chain reaction among his supporters. "Try to deny it now, Steve." At the time, I told the lovely Ramona that this is what truly bothers me about Trump. I expect the average guy on the street to misunderstand what some of these studies are saying, but for a Presidential Candidate this is pretty basic stuff. So, allow me to lay out my case again why Trump is wrong and I was right, and this time I will have a little affirmation from those in the know.

First, let's go over the findings of the study, and then we will talk about what they do and do not mean.

• Approximately 24 million—one of every eight—voter registrations in the United States are no longer valid or are significantly inaccurate.
• More than 1.8 million deceased individuals are listed as voters.
• Approximately 2.75 million people have registrations in more than one state.

What doesn't this mean?

This does not mean that one single fraudulent vote has been cast, nor that any individual voter has knowingly or willingly attempted to defraud the system.

What does this mean?

This means that some people are deceased, yet still registered to vote, while others are registered to vote in more than one state, and that the states have done a sloppy job of maintaining the voter roles.

Simply put, if you are registered to vote and then you die, then you will be a dead person on the voting roles from the moment you die until such time as your name is cleared out. Also, if you are registered to vote in one state, and then you move to another state and register to vote there you will be registered in 2 States until such time as your previous home state clears you off the roles. However, none of this means that you have done anything wrong. No voter fraud has taken place until such time as something like this happens.

An election judge in the Metro-East is accused of sending in an absentee ballot in her late husband’s name.
Audrey Cook tells The Associated Press that she filled out the ballot for her husband because “he wanted to live so badly to see (Donald) Trump straighten out this stinking mess.”
The 88-year-old lives in Alton. Her husband, Vic, died in September.  

And yes, you read that correctly. A dead man voting not for a Democrat, but for Donald Trump. Which kinda calls into question his logic when his press secretary makes statements like this about Trump's belief that millions of illegal votes cost him the popular vote.

"The President does believe that, I think he's stated that before, and stated his concern of voter fraud and people voting illegally during the campaign and continues to maintain that belief based on studies and evidence people have brought to him," 

Oh, good! "He's not a liar, he's a crackpot" is the official White House position. Not only does he believe that millions of people voted illegally, he believes that every single one of them voted for his opponent. Persecution complex much? In addition to the above study that doesn't mean what Trump thinks it means, Spicer also referenced this study which the CCES already debunked. So great, we have a President who doesn't comprehend what he is reading, and doesn't recognize errors when they are pointed out by the people who made them. What could go wrong?

Even more disturbing is the underlying flaw in his logic that leads to him talking about this in the first place. Some people are questioning his legitimacy as President based on the notion that he lost the popular vote. So his response is to try to delegitimize the entire election that got him there, assuming that this will somehow legitimize his claim to the office? How does this make sense to anyone?

Worse still is the fact that there is a huge problem presented in the first study that Trump should be calling attention to. States need to do a much better job of cleaning up their voter roles. The current condition leaves them open to a type of voter fraud that is very tough to detect and impossible to correct. What am I talking about?

Let's say you lived in Michigan, but you move to Indiana. As voting day approaches, you realize that, while Trump has a comfortable lead in Indiana it is coming down to the wire in Michigan. Having recently moved, you decide to go back to your former state and see if you are still on the voter roles. You are, so you proceed to cast a vote for Trump in a battleground state instead of casting your meaningless vote in Indiana. As long as you only vote once, it is difficult to detect that you cast an illegal vote. Furthermore, there is no way to identify your specific ballot so in the event that you were caught, there is no way to know which candidate should lose one vote.

It would be nice if we had a President who was secure enough to realize that he won where he needed to win, and in the end that is all that matters. It would be nicer still if we had a President who was intelligent enough to comprehend what he was reading and draw the correct conclusions. And don't be mad at me, Trump fans. I was perfectly willing to post this article under the "Alternative Facts" category and chalk it up as another Trump whopper. It's his people who are insisting that he honestly believes this one, so for now it isn't a lie. It's just another unsettling reminder of the instability of the man we have chosen to run our Country. Good luck, America. It looks like we're going to be needing it.