Peter Ticktin
In the aftermath of the midterms, it is clear that the faltering but resilient election denial movement — made up of a strange amalgamation of MAGA media figures and their allies in government —- lost in every conceivable way.
Democrats won the House and Senate by historic margins, deflating all but a few deadenders who were still trying to claim voter fraud until the last minute. On election night, even former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, whose War Room podcast has been a hub of the denialist movement, looked for enemies to blame more than supposed fraud to undercover.
But any hopes that the election denial fever has permanently broken are premature. Rejecting Democratic Party wins remains a core, foundational element of the movement that Trump built and will likely continue to be one for the foreseeable future.
To MAGA media, bad polls were a “psyop”
By the final weeks of the campaign, MAGA media was staring down major losses with few counterattacks other than to criticize polling, an act of desperation that aged poorly.
The talking point solidified around late September, when Bannon called the midterm polling a “psyop,” a term his guest, Republican strategist Alex DeGrasse, agreed with. Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts also said the data was a “psyop by so many of these polling firms in order to do what, to depress conservative turnout.” And right-wing media figure John Solomon suggested that public polling was potentially a “suppression tool,” citing his guest, Rep. Jimmy Patronis (R-FL).
MAGA media gadfly Wayne Allyn Root was pushing that line until the eve of the election, arguing that “anyone who believes polls in Texas showing that Talafreako is winning is a fool.”
These types of claims echo Fox News’ editorial approach to the 2020 election. In the final days before voters cast their ballots that year, Fox regularly used anecdotal evidence to suggest that the race was much closer than polls suggested, thereby helping to set the stage for the January 6 riot. The events of that day wouldn’t have been possible had right-wing media not fully embraced and amplified false narratives about insecure elections, underscoring how the so-called election integrity movement is fundamentally anti-democratic.
For years within MAGA media it has been taken as gospel that any discrepancies in polling — including phenomena like a “red mirage” that misleadingly shows Republicans with an early lead — is proof positive of voter fraud. Last minute attempts by right-wing media to seed that doubt again this cycle seem to have proven inadequate, given the losses Republicans faced across the country, but nonetheless were one tool in the toolbox.
The plots failed, but it wasn’t for a lack of trying from MAGA media
The denialist movement’s recent strategies and tactics coalesced at times, but the coalition was deeply disorganized by the time the polls opened.
Over the summer, MAGA media figures like former Trump adviser Steve Bannon and conspiracy theorist Wayne Allyn Root, concocted a conspiracy in plain sight that aimed to push Trump to declare a national emergency or issue an executive order seizing control of election systems. That didn’t happen.
Former Colorado county clerk Tina Peters, a hero in the election denial movement, and her lawyer, Peter Ticktin, who claims to be a childhood friend of Trump’s, allegedly met with the president in the White House on at least two occasions since June. Peters has said that she called on Trump to issue an executive order banning machines or mail-in ballots. That didn’t happen either.
Right-wing media spent months urging Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, which would’ve mandated federal voter ID laws and would’ve forced people to prove their citizenship at the time of registration. The act has been stalled for months, and has no path to becoming law at this point.
Bannon spent over a year calling for Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to stalk polling sites. That didn’t happen. Neither did the Trump administration heed the call from right-wing media figure Jerome Corsi, who reportedly circulated a draft national emergency order, to deploy the military or National Guard to administer or otherwise oversee elections.
As of right now, there is no indication that Trump has the appetite to declare martial law after the election but before certification, as Ticktin has repeatedly called for. Nor are there signs that his administration will attempt to seize voting machines or ballots.
For as much as these figures were desperate to spread confusion in the run-up to voting and sow doubt afterwards, they have largely failed.
Election denial remains at the core of MAGA
After a political movement attempts an insurrection like we saw on January 6, 2021, it is a mistake not to take their threats seriously. The coalition that made that day possible was composed of longtime conservative movement lawyers like Cleta Mitchell and John Eastman, former advisers like Bannon, and right-wing media figures like Alex Jones and the late Charlie Kirk, all of whom came together in an action designed to prevent the certification of a federal election.
Similarly, the plot to subvert the midterms before they happened included then-Director of National Intelligence Bill Pulte and his chief of staff, as well as media figures like Peters, Ticktin, Root, and more. Under the second Trump term, the boundaries between top government official and bizarre curiosity on an obscure livestream are not clear, which makes it a challenge to evaluate whether the MAGA media kooks and cranks that make up so much of his social life really have their hands of the levers of power or if they are simply gassing themselves up to impress their audiences.
In this case, many of the most bombastic and anti-democratic proposals ultimately went nowhere or failed — but, like a zombie, the election denial movement is brainless but not dead. Root, for his part, responded to the results by arguing that the election was stolen but also that Republicans deserved to lose. Mitchell wrote on social media that the “work of securing our elections is FAR from completed,” while failing to articulate any concrete next steps. True the Vote, a key organization in this space, sent out a fundraising request the morning after the midterms. Trump-aligned think tank the America First Policy Institute is seeking information about the administration of elections in Minnesota. And MAGA “prophet” Julie Green said: “There was a red wave last night. It was stolen.”
Bannon recently said in a CBS News interview that “the core belief of the MAGA movement is we won the 2020 election.” That load-bearing myth will likely continue to be central to whatever political formation arrives after Trump shuffles off the stage.
Reprinted with permission from Media Matters
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