The disproportionately excessive degree of concern among the many Fox Information viewers comes after years of Donald Trump selling falsehoods about elections.
Trump has infamously claimed that he received the 2020 election “by a lot” after he misplaced each the favored vote and Electoral Faculty to now-President Joe Biden. Trump has additionally alleged that hundreds of thousands of votes for Biden have been fraudulent, and he was indicted on federal prices for his efforts to subvert the election.
Even after he received the 2016 election, Trump pushed lies about fraud. That 12 months, Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton misplaced the Electoral Faculty however defeated Trump within the widespread vote by almost 3 million votes. Regardless of his victory, Trump lied and mentioned, “I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”
Trump’s allies on the conservative Fox Information, the place lots of the ballot’s registered voters get a lot of their info, have an extended historical past of selling election-fraud falsehoods. Within the 2024 marketing campaign cycle, the community’s hosts and pundits have repeatedly pushed tales about Democrats conspiring to steal elections and promoted the parable of noncitizens voting in droves.
Fox Information has continued this apply regardless of going through monetary penalties for selling Trump’s 2020 election lies. In 2023, Fox Information paid Dominion Voting Techniques almost $800 million in a settlement after the voting companies agency sued the community for airing falsehoods in regards to the firm.
The ballot sadly finds that 60% of registered voters have been a minimum of considerably involved about election fraud. Such fraud within the U.S. is extraordinarily uncommon. The Brennan Heart for Justice notes that “most allegations of fraud turn out to be baseless and that most of the few remaining allegations reveal irregularities and other forms of election misconduct.”
However voter suppression is actual, and varied techniques associated to suppressing the vote—significantly amongst minority and youth voters—have been embraced by conservatives and Republicans over time.
And on the uncommon event when fraud associated to elections has occurred, current circumstances have typically concerned actions completed both by Republicans or with the intent of serving to Republican candidates.