All 50 States Say There’s No Evidence of Voter Fraud

Despite that fact, most prominent GOP members still haven’t recognized President-elect Joe Biden.

Despite the GOP’s unfounded cries of a rigged electoral system (and made without any evidence to back those claims up), research has found no evidence of voter fraud in the 2020 election. 

Even before the election, President Donald Trump made frequent claims about potential fraud, especially with mail-in ballots, again without any evidence. The United States saw a massive increase in mail-in and early voting this year, as Americans tried to avoid crowding polling locations and slow the spread of COVID-19. Despite the huge change in normal routine, the 2020 election went remarkably smoothly.

Dozens of officials in both political parties across the country have reported no evidence of fraud or other irregularities that could have swung the outcome of the election. In short, President-elect Joe Biden won equitably and by a significant margin. 

“Kansas did not experience any widespread, systematic issues with voter fraud, intimidation, irregularities or voting problems,” a spokesperson for Scott Schwab, the Republican secretary of state, told the New York Times. “We are very pleased with how the election has gone up to this point.” 

The New York Times contacted elections officials in all 50 states, and found none reported any notable issues with the validity of the voting process.

Larry Garber, a professor at University of Arizona Law School who serves on the National Task Force on Election Crises, said the election was conducted better than officials had hoped. 

“All the concerns that had been raised beforehand, you know concerns that the counting process would be marred by various challenges to counting specific ballots and slowing down the process, that didn’t happen,” he told COURIER in an earlier interview. “Counting has been slow and methodical but we haven’t seen one party or another abusing the system to prevent votes from being counted.” 

No election is completely free from small problems. Some states reported and addressed a few instances of double voting, technical glitches and some minor errors in math. State officials are conducting their own review of voting which is standard for any election. None of those errors, however, would come at all close to changing the outcome of the election in any of the closest states, where Biden holds the lead by tens of thousands of votes.

In the days since Biden was announced as the projected winner, Trump allies like Rudolph Giuliani have repeatedly cried fraud, especially in Pennsylvania, despite overwhelming evidence that no such fraud occurred.

“Many of the claims against the commonwealth have already been dismissed, and repeating these false attacks is reckless,” said a spokeswoman for Pennsylvania’s Attorney General to the New York Times. “No active lawsuit even alleges, and no evidence presented so far has shown widespread problems.” 

Garber noted that the US could see recounts in some states but it’s unlikely they would change the outcome of the election. 

“The expectation is that based on prior history that the changes in the numbers will be relatively small,” he said. In previous elections recounts have uncovered hundreds of votes but “certainly not in the thousands,” he said. “So we’ve got a pretty good record.”