Trump revives the specter of voter fraud for the November midterm elections

WashingtonUnpopularity is increasingly plaguing Donald Trump, who is trying to counter it with the specter of voter fraud. Nine months before the midterm elections, the president is already preparing the ground for the prospect of losing control of Congress. This week, the president raised the need to "nationalize" the electoral process—which is the responsibility of the states, not the federal government—and defended his proposed legislation to combat alleged "fraud." Trump supporters have long claimed that Democratic states allow undocumented immigrants to vote in order to retain power. These accusations have never been proven, but both Elon Musk and Trump himself spread them during the 2024 presidential campaign. They forgot as soon as the count proclaimed Trump the winner. Now that the upcoming elections seem to be getting more complicated, it has been brought up again.

In parallel, the totem of the MAGA movement, Steve Bannon, has already verbalized a proposal that is one of the biggest fears they've been planning for some time among political analysts. Aware of the impact that the murders of two citizens at the hands of anti-immigration agents have had on American societyBannon has called for the deployment of ICE to polling places in November. According to the former Trump advisor, this should prevent undocumented immigrants from voting. "We will have ICE surrounding the polling places in November. We will not stand idly by, and we will not allow them to steal the country again," Bannon said Tuesday on his podcast. "And they can complain, cry, and make all the noise they want, but we will not allow them to steal another election from us."

Theinfluencer The far-right group reiterated its proposal the following day, adding that Trump should go even further and send military personnel to polling places. "President Trump must nationalize the election. He must mobilize not only ICE, he must call up the 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions, under the Insurrection Act." Federal law prohibits the president from deploying military troops "anywhere a general or special election is being held," and in several states it is a crime to carry a firearm in or near a polling place. Not long ago, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth threatened to retaliate against Senator Mark Kelly—a Navy veteran—for reminding service members that they are not obligated to obey unconstitutional orders. He threatened him with the possibility of a court-martial.The Trump administration has been in power for months. The Pentagon is closing its doors to the press to prevent leaks. of internal criticism and imposing iron-fisted control.

Fear of going to vote

"The presence of ICE or Border Patrol agents, or, for example, members of the military or the National Guard, as we have seen in various places throughout the year, could cause people to stay home and not vote. This is a form of manipulation, since it means that not everyone will be able to exercise their right to vote," says an American politician and member of Issue One.

Since before the 2024 presidential election, this nonpartisan platform has been monitoring the impact of election fraud theories on citizens' trust in the democratic system. Ong explains that Trump's recent statements have put both election officials in the states and volunteers working on election day on high alert. "We continue to see threats, harassment, and intimidation of election officials, and based on what we have seen historically, we know that when there is rhetoric that undermines trust in elections and in the people in our communities who manage them, this will escalate," she says. Political scientist. The theories of electoral fraud spread by Trump in 2020, claiming that the election had been stolen from him, led to a situation in key states such as Arizona had to implement extreme measures. In Maricopa, a group of people Armed women arrived at the vote counting point Following Trump's claims that the election was "stolen" from him.

In another invocation of his 2020 election fraud theory—which has been refuted in dozens of court cases—several FBI vans arrived Wednesday in Fulton County, Georgia, and raided a warehouse without warning. Federal agents were searching for ballots from the election in which Trump lost to Joe Biden. In total, they seized 700 boxes of ballots, meaning the Trump administration will now determine whether the 2020 election was legitimate. Along with Maricopa County, Fulton County, with its predominantly African American and immigrant population, was the epicenter of the election fraud theories.

Lies about migrants

The campaign of lies about undocumented immigrants voting in the elections coincides with Tuesday's vote in Congress.Save America Act. This Republican legislative proposal is part of a broader narrative that seeks to establish the idea that federal government control of elections is necessary to prevent alleged voter fraud in some states favoring Democrats. The draft bill proposes significant changes to how Americans vote, such as requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote, eliminating mail-in voting, and mandating photo identification in all states for the first time. Unlike Spain, the United States does not have a universal national identity card; instead, citizens primarily use either a driver's license or a passport as identification. Democrats and other organizations have criticized the draft bill, arguing that it could disenfranchise large segments of legitimate voters under the guise of combating a supposed epidemic of undocumented immigrant voting, which they claim does not exist. "If you are one of the millions of American citizens who do not have access to your birth certificate, or if you are one of the 50% of Americans who do not have a passport, the Save Your Citizen Act could make it impossible for you to participate in elections," warned Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer this week.