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Notes -
For sure, and I actually say as much in my reply to WalterOdim here.
It’s very likely (and of course historically proven) that low-level functionaries involved in the political process in various counties across the US engage in forms of corruption up to and including Actual Rigging (meaning actually manipulating vote totals). And it is true that, in an incredibly close election, this could serve (and has served) to elect one candidate over the other. I’m very sceptical that the ‘deep state’ or indeed any DC bureaucrat is involved in that kind of action, I think it’s ground-up and low level, and I think supporters of both parties engage in it. But it happens, and I think it’s important to acknowledge it.
But this isn’t the typical claim. The narrative from hardcore Trumpist rigging claimants isn’t typically that Trump almost legitimately lost but that he actually won a tiny number of additional ballots (or local Democrats added extra Biden votes) on a tiny scale in one Georgia county. It’s that a huge conspiracy prevented their candidate, who was supposedly vastly more popular, from winning nationwide by a huge margin. The question ‘do you concede that, even if you’re correct about those ballots, Trump could very easily (and almost did) fully legitimately lose the 2020 election, and if he did actually win, he won by a tiny amount?’ is the telling one here. As is (and this is even more important) ‘did something beyond the low-level hum of corruption that has been a feature of American democracy since 1776 occur specifically to prevent Trump from being re-elected?’.
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