16 hours Ago By USA TODAY
A Nov. 6 Threads post ( , ) claims vote totals point to election fraud in the 2024 presidential election. "Harris shouldn't concede," the post reads.
"20 million less votes than last election? 14 million more votes for Trump over Harris? Trump and those around him were more than confident Trump would win. How did they know? We need an investigation. This election was stolen.
" Other social , asserting that Vice President Kamala Harris received 20 million fewer votes than President Joe Biden received in 2020. The Threads post was liked 1,000 times in a week. | | The post's erroneous claim of a "stolen" election was based on early and incomplete results in the Nov.
5 election. The votes weren't all counted as of Nov. 6 − and they still aren't − but tallies as of Nov.
13 show there is no voting gap of 20 million, and the margin between Vice President Kamala Harris and President-elect Donald Trump is far closer than 14 million. The Associated Press for Trump early on Nov. 6, the same day the Threads post was shared.
However, the results of the Nov. 5 election were not finalized on that date. Votes are still being counted across the country as of Nov.
13, meaning the vote gaps in the post were based on incomplete information and are not indicative of electoral wrongdoing. The post doesn't specify what the 20 million-vote gap is comparing, but it's wrong in any case. About were cast in the 2020 presidential election, according to Federal Election Commission numbers.
The post, on Nov. 6, was claiming the 2024 total falls well short of that, but that's a nonsensical claim at that juncture since many votes had yet to be counted at that point. expected a total of 156 million votes in the 2024 presidential election as of Nov.
13. As of Nov. 6, only 141.
9 million votes had been counted, or about 91%, according to an of election results reported by NBC News. About 150.2 million votes had been counted as of Nov.
13, the . In other words, the 2020 to 2024 gap was about 16 million votes as of Nov. 6, but once the count is complete the gap is expected to be around 2 million.
There's also no 20 million-vote gap between Democratic totals in the last two elections, if that's the point the post was attempting to make. Biden received about 81.3 million votes in the 2020 presidential election, according to results published by the .
As of Nov. 13, Harris tallied about 72.5 million votes, according to , a difference of about 8.
8 million votes. Harris had about as of Nov. 6.
The post is also wrong about Trump leading Harris by more than 14 million votes. By the , Trump's lead over Harris stood at about 3.1 million votes as of Nov.
13. Trump led Harris by about on Nov. 6.
School of Law, said in an email. In the Democratic stronghold of California, for example, the that 84% of votes had been counted as of Nov. 13.
Harris led Trump by about 21 percentage points there, suggesting she could make up more ground against Biden's 2020 performance and Trump's 2024 lead in the national popular vote as the state continues its count. County election officials in California are working toward to report official results to the California Secretary of State's Office, which will certify results on Dec. 13.
: The post asserts voting tallies indicate fraud, but there have also been no credible reports of widespread voter fraud in the 2024 presidential election. To the contrary, reported Election Day went smoothly outside of a few notable disruptions, such as hoax bomb threats in several swing states. "Thanks to tireless preparation and work by thousands of election workers across the country, the 2024 election was free and fair," Ramachandran said.
, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, said in a that the agency had "no evidence of any malicious activity that had a material impact on the security or integrity of our election infrastructure." And in her Nov. 6 , Harris said, "When we lose an election, we accept the results.
" USA TODAY reached out to the Threads user who shared the post for comment but did not immediately receive a response. also debunked the claim. , Nov.
12, Email exchange with USA TODAY Jen Easterly, Nov. 6, Federal Elections Commission, October 2022, The Associated Press, accessed Nov. 13, The Cook Political Report, The Associated Press, Nov.
5, NPR, Nov. 6, CNN, Nov. 6, The New York Times, accessed Nov.
13, NBC News (Internet Archive), Nov. 6, Nate Silver, Nov. 13,.
