Trump’s Historically False Press Conference
I watched Trump’s press conference, so you didn’t have to. Let me tell you it was really f***ing hard to watch and not just turn it off. From attacking our election process to allegations of making up fake ballots to help Biden. Trump spouted every conspiracy theory there is around the election to try and sow as much doubt as he can. Much of what he said was false and shouldn’t be said by a sitting President it is important to know what was said and know the facts surrounding it.
Immediately when he got to the podium, he continued with what he’s said since early Wednesday morning, that he won this election and the only way he didn’t was a fraud. So far this election there has not been any illegal votes cast so what we see right now being reported are all legal votes. In this allegation, he is basically referring to mail-in ballots as illegal votes which they are not, and bringing up how Pennsylvania is counting ballots received after Nov. 3rd however Pennsylvania hasn’t opened a single ballot received after election day so all the votes we see in Pennsylvania have been received on or before election day He continued to say they’re counting mail-in ballots without postmarks which is categorically false because of they aren’t counting any ballots received after Nov. 3rd. Later on, in his speech he talked about Georgia and how there was a pipe burst in Atlanta and they stopped voting there even though they didn’t have to. Then he inferred quite bluntly that during that pause in counting that illegal ballots were put there to help Biden. Even going as far as saying the elections in Georgia are run by Democrats which is one of the most baseless allegations, he said during the speech all elections are run by Secretary of States and Georgia’s Secretary of the state is a Republican. If a Republican is helping Democrats win Georgia that would be a headline for the history books, but it’s false, as much of what he said today at his conference. However, during that time where the counters were sent home, anyone was welcome to come in to make sure nothing was happening all you had to do is answer Covid-19 related questions, and you were allowed in. He went on to bring up North Carolina which by all news outlets suspects he will win and a state also run by Republicans as well and said that he was winning, but then a bunch of mail-in ballots were received, and suddenly he wasn’t winning as much. North Carolina was a state left alone even by Qanon Twitter for good reason, there is basically no shot for Biden to win that state, but Trump is throwing around allegations in every state except Arizona. Why would he leave Arizona alone? Arizona is the only state where mail-in ballots actually can help him. This should tell you everything you need to know about how Trump works “If I’m losing it’s fraud if I’m winning there isn’t”.
One of the ways he tries to prove that voter fraud is happening is shouting baseless claims about poll watchers. If you didn’t know what poll watchers were before this week that’s not surprising. Poll Watchers are partisan members selected by the party of each state selected to watch ballots be opened and then scanned. In Michigan, candidates can actually appoint their own poll watchers which Trump most definitely should’ve if he were so worried about election fraud. While in Pennsylvania you have to a registered voter but still allows political parties to appoint them. Neither state allows random citizens to just walk in to look at ballots this would in fact defeat our use of the Australian ballot that allows anonymous votes. He attacked Michigan and Pennsylvania for not allowing Poll Watchers to bring up a story about Michigan duplicating ballots and poll watchers stepped in to stop it. While this never happened and he was probably referring to this story where poll watchers were kicked out by police because there were more than allowed by both parties. While one of the few true things he said during the press conference was when Michigan counting centers blocked windows. This wasn’t illegal and while it was blocked by outside observers who were protestors shouting “stop the count,” that voting center had poll watchers from the GOP of that state this did not block any oversight from actual poll watchers. The story actually says that the GOP had too many poll watchers there and nothing about how they all were kicked out but rather they had to stay at the 134-limit set by the state. While it is true, Donald Trump won cases in both Michigan and Pennsylvania the wins were not about allowing poll watchers in it was rather about letting them stand closer to the poll workers. Neither Pennsylvania nor Michigan have banned poll watchers from doing their job all they’ve done was prevent random citizens from the street from taking on the job of a poll watcher.
Donald Trump’s press conference was not that of a President set to win reelection it was rather more like one of a man worried about his chances and trying to sow doubt about the validity of the election. From his premature announcement of him winning the election to attacking the hard-working people counting votes day and night in Pennsylvania, much of what he said was false. It seems as if Trump’s policy on vote-counting is to continue to count in states he is losing and stop in states he is winning. This isn’t a policy of a duly elected leader of the free world but rather that of a dictator. These comments shouldn’t be taken lightly and should be continuously fact-checked throughout the election process. It is the duty of all news organizations to show his comments but to also make sure the American people know what he is saying is false.
