The same NY Times has still failed to cover the news that Hillary Clinton personally authorized the lies about him for the 2016 election, which led to years of investigations, a loss of trust in the FBI, losing the 2018 midterms, and a huge chunk of Democrats believing the 2016 election was stolen. The Times itself had numerous opinion pieces, and opinion pieces disguised as straight news, taking this opinion. But, now (available at Yahoo News if Times’ paywall gets you)
Trump’s Lies About 2020 Election Take Root in Statehouses
At least 357 sitting Republican legislators in closely contested battleground states have used the power of their office to discredit or try to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, according to a review of legislative votes, records and official statements by The New York Times.
The tally accounts for 44% of the Republican legislators in the nine states where the presidential race was most narrowly decided. In each of those states, the election was conducted without any evidence of widespread fraud, leaving election officials from both parties in agreement on Joe Biden’s victory.
The Times’ analysis exposes how deeply rooted lies and misinformation about former President Donald Trump’s defeat have become in state legislatures, which play an integral role in U.S. democracy. In some, the false view that the election was stolen — either by fraud or as a result of pandemic-related changes to the process — is now widely accepted as fact among Republican lawmakers, turning statehouses into hotbeds of conspiratorial thinking and specious legal theories.
How dare they believe this! It’s not like there lots of weird events that happened on election day and for the days after. Things like stopped counting, counting in secret, blocking anyone from seeing what they were doing, that all sorts of ballots suddenly showed up, going mostly for Biden, etc and so on. That there were tons of irregularities with the drop boxes, first of which was that they were mostly not allowed by law.
These fictions about rigged elections and widespread fraud have provided the foundation for new laws that make it harder to vote and easier to insert partisanship in the vote count. In three states, Arizona, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, state lawmakers successfully pushed for investigations that sowed doubt about the results and tested the boundaries of their oversight.
And yet the Times’ analysis also shows that these efforts have encountered significant resistance from key Republican figures, as well as Democrats. In most states, the lawmakers who challenged the 2020 results do not yet have the numbers, or the support of governors, secretaries of state or legislative leaders, to achieve their most audacious aims.
Does the Times remember its own role in the 2016 election aftermath, pushing the narrative that Trump stole it thanks to Putin? How about the narrative that still resides in Democrat heads that Bush stole 2000? The Times did its best to avoid the reality, that Supreme Court ruled based on Florida law. Oh, and that Bush stole 2004, via Ohio this time.
How about the decades long Democrat belief that Bush let and/or made 9/11 happen? Polls show that around 47% of Democrats believe that Bush either let 9/11 happen or made it happen. That it was an inside job. The Times didn’t do much to knock the 9/11 Trutherism down. Nor the whole narrative of their favorite Dem Stacy Abrams having the Georgia election stolen from her. Or, how about the special elections in Georgia for Senate. So, pardon me if I’m not too concerned about Republicans who see the problems with the 2020 election. And you know Democrats will caterwaul if a Republican wins the White House in 2024.
Read: NY Times Seems Upset So Many Republicans Believe 2020 Was Stolen »