'You're a moron!' Election deniers lash out at Lara Trump
Election deniers have already seized on some isolated mistakes in the voting process in Michigan, and even Republican National Committee co-chair Lara Trump can't reassure them.
A formatting error sparked confusion over the number of ballots cast in the key swing state, although the mistake was swiftly corrected with no extra votes being counted, but prominent election denier Matthew DePerno claimed on social media that his review of a voter records database showed more than 160,000 excess ballots were cast, reported CNN.
“Each of these voters only had one vote recorded for this election," the Michigan secretary of state's office said in a statement. "This error in the data export process has been corrected and these erroneous extra lines no longer appear on the report."
RNC co-chair Lara Trump, the daughter-in-law of Donald Trump, tried to clear up the falsehoods around the formatting error, which matched Democratic secretary of state Jocelyn Benson's explanation.
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“It was a glitch in the system," Lara Trump posted on X. "These duplicates were not and WILL NOT BE COUNTED.”
However, DePerno, a former GOP nominee for state attorney general who was charged last year in connection with efforts to illegally access and tamper with voting machines in 2020, wasn't buying the RNC leader's explanation.
“If you believe this is an export issue then you are a moron," DePerno told CNN.
Right-wing conspiracy website The Gateway Pundit, which helped the former president spread 2020 election falsehoods, was also dubious of the official explanations for what its editors called a "voting scandal."
“Bless Lara’s heart, but this is not acceptable and likely inaccurate,” The Gateway Pundit wrote.
Even when they're debunked or explained, experts say false claims about election security undermine faith and trust in the process.
“The explanation has a lot less reach than the initial claim … when you compare the reach of government officials, it makes it impossible for information to catch up with viral claims,” said Ben Decker, the CEO of threat intelligence group Memetica. “These are kind of the canary in the coal mine of post-Election Day disinformation narratives.”