As the general election gets closer, and as he continues to lose to Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden in national-level polls and in polls in important swing states, President Donald Trump keeps wheeling out kooky conspiracy theories seemingly meant to serve as a prepared excuse in case he loses. On Monday, he wheeled out another one of these conspiracy theories during his first speech to the Republican National Convention (RNC), which he was slated to speak as a part of on every day of the event. Complaining about the usage of mail-in ballots, Trump claimed that the upcoming election will feature “the greatest scam in the history of politics,” which is just an utterly outrageous and baseless claim.
He said:
‘This is going to be one of the greatest scams — and it’s common sense, this has nothing to do with politics. It’s common sense. Anybody — you don’t have to know politics! — they’re going to mail out 80 million ballots. It’s impossible; they have no idea. Who’s mailing ’em? Mostly Democrat states and Democrat governors. Well, supposing they don’t mail ’em to Republican neighborhoods. That means they’re not going to get ’em. So they’re gonna complain, and then the election’s gonna be over, and they’re gonna complain, and they’ll say oh well, we didn’t get it, big deal — in the meantime, you might lose the election!’
There is not a single apparent shred of evidence — not a single shred — suggesting that any Democratic authority anywhere in the country is plotting to mail ballots to Democrats and not Republicans. This conspiracy theory is completely based on nonsensical conjecture, and that’s it.
Still, reality hasn’t ever majorly deterred Trump in the past, and it didn’t now. He added:
‘This is the greatest scam in the history of politics, I think. And I’m talking about beyond our nation.’
Trump is completely delusional. Watch his nonsensical comments below:
"This is going to be one of the greatest scams … this is the greatest scam in the history of politics, I think. And I'm talking about beyond our nation." — Trump on the 2020 election pic.twitter.com/hdo9QbbPVt
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 24, 2020
Think about it — in the whole wide world of the political history of all the countries of the world, Donald thinks that a conspiracy theory that he made up in response to basic political processes represents “the greatest scam in the history” of the world.
Trump has used similar language when he’s discussed the Russia investigation — he’s characterized it as the biggest “witch hunt” and/or political scandal in history, claiming, among other nonsense, that the Obama administration spied on his 2016 presidential campaign — which, quite simply, never happened. The Obama administration carried out judicially-supervised surveillance of a former Trump adviser once that ex-aide, Carter Page, no longer had anything to do with the campaign.
Meanwhile, Trump’s baseless claim that Democratic authorities will keep ballots from Republican voters is far from his first election-related conspiracy theory. He has also claimed that a widespread usage of those mail-in ballots will lead to widespread fraud, which is a totally evidence-less claim. Mail-in ballots have already been used at a widespread rate for awhile — five states have even previously conducted elections almost entirely via the mail. Basic security measures are in place for the process, which Trump consistently seems completely willfully ignorant of.
