MAGA attacks elections with whopper lies

Markwayne Mullin, the MAGA thug in charge

of subverting the 2026 elections

By now, most reasonable people paying at least a little attention to politics are aware that Trump and MAGA elites are doing their very best to subvert, rig and suppress voting before the 2026 mid-term elections. The lying MAGA elites use to attack and undermine election integrity is off the charts. The whoppers are coming fast and furious.

In recent months, Trump and MAGA elites alleged they found more than 250,000 noncitizens on the voter rolls of Nevada and three other states. Other Trump attacks on election included statements that voting machines are vulnerable to manipulation, but he provided no evidence to support that had happened. He also alleged that China obtained 220 million US voter files beginning in the run-up to the 2020 election, that too was not backed up by solid evidence that had happened or that any vote irregularities happened if it did happen.

Other reporting indicates that MAGA continues to make the broad claim that American elections are rife with noncitizen voters. But no evidence backs that up. In one incident, DHS said it found close to 16,000 noncitizens on Nevada’s voter list. But a DHS official acknowledged in the meeting with Nevada officials that number was the ceiling and each voter still had to be manually reviewed. Then, a day later, DHS provided a list of 185 ID numbers pertaining to voters the agency said it was confident were noncitizens. Nevada asked for more information on those 185 voters, and the data used to match them to noncitizens. DHS refused to provide the evidence. The agency did say it still had more than 14,000 Nevada voters that need additional review, and it also provided the state with a list of more than 6,000 voter IDs the agency said were higher confidence matches but had yet to be reviewed.

Well, it turns out that the number of noncitizen voters, 250,000, 16,000, 6,000, 185, 1 or whatever the number is in whatever states they were supposed to be illegally registered in has turned out to be 100% false. DHS is unable to confirm that there is even 1 noncitizen voter on the Nevada rolls. We went from an allegation of 250,000 illegally registered voters to zero.

That is the scale of lying that Trump’s MAGA administration is spewing on us in its focused attempt to subvert the upcoming elections.

Q1: Are Trump and his authoritarian MAGA elites in power a bunch of lying liars trying hard to wreck the upcoming elections, and if not why do they talk and act as if they were? What is the evidence that MAGA is acting in good faith?

Q2: Is it reasonable to believe that MAGA elites dealing with election and voter matters are (1) grossly incompetent, or (2) worse, authoritarian liars knowingly trying to subvert democracy and elections, because they can’t find even 1 noncitizen illegally registered to vote in at least 4 states?**

** Common sense says that there has to be at least a few noncitizens, e.g., maybe ~20-50, illegally registered to vote among the states that DHS claimed to have looked into. If nothing else, people do make honest mistakes.

Some other info sources:

State Board to Check Voter Rolls to Identify, Remove Non-U.S. Citizens

The hunt for noncitizen voters in Georgia yields few results

Unpacking Myths About Noncitizen Voting — How Heritage Foundation’s Own Data Still Proves It’s Not the Problem It’s Made Out to Be

Flaws in Government Tool to ID Noncitizen Voters — But the tool has wrongly flagged many as being noncitizens, and there’s no evidence of widespread noncitizen voting. The data-matching program employed in those states over the last year identified about 10,000 potential noncitizens on voter registration lists, out of about 49 million voter registrations checked, according to reporting by the New York Times citing federal officials. But upon further investigation, county officials found U.S. citizens were among those identified. In addition, election officials determined some noncitizens were inadvertently added by county officials to voter lists, and still others were noncitizens who mistakenly checked a box for voter registration even after acknowledging on the same forms that they were noncitizens. Experts and state audits refute the idea of widespread noncitizen voting.

MAGA’s legacy: A radicalized, authoritarian Supreme Court

Context

Even if MAGA loses control of the House and Senate in the 2026 elections, American democracy, rule of law and civil liberties can still wind up crushed to death and replaced by some form of a cruel, deeply corrupt dictatorship-oligarchy-bigoted Christian nationalist theocracy. Even if the Dems control congress, that institution will remain broken. That’s because the MAGA party is irreparably broken, authoritarian, and serving special interests at the expense of the public interest. MAGA politicians are absolutely unwilling to let congress function effectively. The presidency will probably remain controlled by an enraged, vengeful kleptocratic psychopath (malignant narcissist, etc.) until Jan. 2029.

And then, there’s our MAGAfied USSC (US Supreme Court). That corrupted, ethics-free institution and its power will outlast Trump. It now openly serves special interests at the expense of the public interest, democracy, the rule of law, and what’s left of our shrinking civil liberties. What can we reasonably expect? Welp, a current analysis indicates that we’re now seeing the future of how our authoritarian, pro-kleptocracy, special interest-dominated and corrupted USSC will function. Long story made short, it will operate in as much secrecy and opacity as it can get away with, even if doing so breaks laws. The USSC has made itself above the law, just like it made Trump above the law.

The USSC’s shadow docket

A ProPublica article (and YouTube video), The Supreme Court Changed. What Now?, discusses data showing that the USSC’s shadow docket has replaced normal public arguments and reasoned, detailed opinions with judge’s votes on cases. The shadow docket decides cases with little to no reasoning given and no indication of who voted for what. Most shadow docket decisions are about time-sensitive or procedural matters that are not troubling for democracy, the rule of law or civil liberties. That is no a matter of concern.

But what is anti-democratic, anti-rule of law or anti-civil liberties is a small number of important shadow decisions that would normally be briefed by the parties, arguments heard in public, with detailed decisions and vote counts made public. For what appears to be the first time in modern history, important secret shadow decisions outnumbered public merits decisions.

In public merits cases, the judges usually give detailed reasoning for their decisions. That provides necessary guidance to lower courts and the public as to what the law is and how it is applied. It also tells the public how individual judges voted. That secrecy shields judges’ identities from corrupt votes that give benefits to special interests, usually while either (1) taking benefits from the public interest, or (2) causing damage to democracy, the rule of law or civil liberties, which also generally benefits affected special interests.

A few shadow decisions have been favorable to the public interest democracy, the rule of law or civil liberties. Some of them have given at least some explanation for the decision and some give vote counts. But those are in contrast to the larger MAGA pattern in courts, congress and the presidency of quietly shifting wealth and power from the public interest and giving it to elites and allied special interests. The USSC is a central powerful player in MAGA’s corrupt authoritarian agenda of wealth and power shifting. Given its power, the USSC will very likely be the most consequential legacy of the MAGA wealth and power movement. That legacy will not be on our side. It will be in opposition to us.

Q1: Do you believe that the current USSC is mostly supportive of, or mostly opposed to (1) service to the public interest before service to special interests with wealth, or (2) democracy, the rule of law and/or civil liberties?

Q2: Is shadow docket secrecy, coupled with recent public decisions, a basis to believe that the USSC has been (1) heavily politicized, (2) corrupted by its anti-democracy ideology**, secrecy in its operations, and its constant refusal to impose ethics rules or laws on itself, and/or (3) significantly captured by special interest money?

** The MAGA judges vehemently deny they are anti-democracy. They say they are fiercely pro-democracy and pro-rule of law. Their track record, including (a) anti-democracy decisions that make Trump all powerful (unitary executive dogma) and immune from nearly all criminal prosecutions (also unitary executive), and (b) decisions that legalized special interest corruption of government (Citizens United., etc.). Opinions on this point are bitterly divided.

Some info sources:

Supreme Court ‘Shadow’ Docket Is Now Bigger Than The Real, ‘Transparent’ One

Favorable views of Supreme Court remain near historic low

Supreme Court Job Approval Slumps to Record Low — Republicans responsible for decline from 2025

Supreme Court Shadow Docket Tracker — Challenges to Trump Administration Actions — The Trump administration has prevailed in the vast majority of its requests for emergency action, as the data below shows. These rulings have allowed administration policies to move forward after lower courts had found that the administration’s actions were likely illegal. ….. The lack of reasoning in most shadow docket rulings also leaves lower courts with little guidance about how to address similar issues in other cases.

The Supreme Court “Shadow Docket” Explained

Regarding MAGA and racism

 

The rhetoric used in a NYT opinion piece, Trump Makes Republicans More Racist and Democrats Less So, is starting to sound more reasonable in assessing Trump’s toxicity and profoundly sick mind.

The opinion opens with this: President Trump’s corruption is unequaled by any previous resident of the White House. If anything, his narcissism ranks higher than his corruption. ….. Today, though, I want to look at another destructive aspect of Trump’s ascendancy: what he has done to the nation’s ability to deal with an issue that has plagued the United States since its founding and even before — race. Trump has not only halted the agonizingly slow accommodation of conservative whites to a multiracial nation, he has also legitimated and exacerbated the most toxic attitudes toward race and immigration held by Republican voters.

The opinion goes on to observe that Trump has turned the party of Abraham Lincoln into a political home for people who hold serious racial resentments, are xenophobes and are generally hostile to marginalized ethnic and religious minorities. Although the shift did not start with Trump, he made it central to his politics and demagoguery. Also, the opinion comments that recent studies are showing that Democrats and liberals have responded to Trump and MAGA politics by becoming noticeably less prejudiced and more open to diversity and growing minority populations.

Those assessments are evidence-based and feel reasonably accurate. Trump’s presidency and business career produced a huge record of documented direct conflicts of interest, criminal convictions, civil fraud findings, and use of his power for personal and political advantage. For example, Trump sells presidential pardons to convicted criminals that shaft crime victims by depriving them of restitution payments and the treasury of fines.

Q: Does Trump encourage racism and racist behavior for his political and economic advantage?

Some info sources:

Malignant Narcissism: Does the President Really Have It?

More than 200 health professionals say Trump has ‘malignant narcissism’ in open letter

Trump’s pardons wipe out payments to defrauded victims — In Milton’s case, prosecutors argued that the former CEO of Nikola should pay investors $660 million. But before a judge had the chance to calculate and order restitution, President Donald Trump pardoned Milton — which in addition to sparing him any time behind bars also wiped away any financial penalties.

Pardon brokers offer to “put pressure on the president,” at sky-high costs

Did Donald Trump’s presidency reshape Americans’ prejudices? — People in Donald Trump’s political base, on average, became increasingly willing to declare their disdain toward minoritized ethnic, religious, and cultural groups, both foreign groups and their fellow Americans.

Global racist contagion following Donald Trump’s election

United States: Racial Resentment, Negative Partisanship, and Polarization in Trump’s America

A deep dive with AI into our political situation

Context

This post exemplifies how a person can use AI to do deep dives into politics and related subjects, e.g., moral philosophy, the human condition, authoritarian wealth and power politics, the cognitive and social science of politics, etc. Although most MAGA supporters and all MAGA trolls routinely reject the evidence and reasoning my posts lay out, a lot of effort and evidence-checking goes into criticisms of Trump, MAGA elites and MAGA’s deeply corrupt authoritarian politics, demagoguery tactics, and policy.

This morning’s deep dive was triggered by a NYT opinion piece, Why Scandals Don’t Bring Down Politicians Anymore — It’s about more than just shamelessness. That led to a Q&A series with Pxy (my AI Perplexity). Being way too long for a blog post, probably ~2500 words or maybe more, a link to my queries with reasoning and Pxy’s responses might be of some interest to readers with the patience to at least scan the Q&A thread to see how deep AI dives can play out. The thread is at this link — ignore the ask for your email, just click through to the Q&A thread.

The main thrust of the Q&As wasn’t about the NYT opinion. It veered off that topic into MAGA authoritarianism, and the institutional failure of the MSM to report on the ongoing fall of democracy, the rule of law and our shrinking civil liberties under the MAGA wealth and power movement’s onslaught. Examples help clarify the back and forth between me and Pxy.

Example 1

Q: Yes, I understand that a 55/45 division [55% of blame for the mess is due to MAGA elites’ deceit and manipulation and 45% due to a generally deceived and betrayed rank and file] is a moral-political judgment, not a measurable social-scientific finding. I get it. I read the social science. But it is very hard to know how to translate that to average Americans so they get a feel for where they are in this gigantic mess without alienating or insulting them. This is my central frustration with politics. And the MSM is utterly useless in dealing with this matter.

A (severely truncated): Your frustration makes sense. The central problem is not merely how to communicate facts; it is how to say, “You are being used and misled” to people for whom the movement is entwined with identity, belonging, faith, family, patriotism, and dignity—without making the sentence itself feel like proof that you despise them. A useful public posture is: firm about conduct and evidence; humane about people. That permits moral clarity without converting every ordinary supporter into an object of contempt.

Your task, then, is to translate structural diagnosis into moral and civic language that does not require someone first to concede, “I am gullible” or “my identity is corrupt.” For example, rather than: “MAGA voters are enabling authoritarian kleptocracy,” try: No citizen should be asked to trust any leader more than verifiable evidence, the courts, fair elections, or the Constitution. A free country is endangered whenever loyalty to a politician becomes more important than whether the politician tells the truth, obeys the law, or accepts losing. That is still a sharp criticism. But it makes the standard universal rather than tribal.

Example 2

Q: I’ve been writing to reporters, editors, opinionators, and academics for years about the threat of authoritarianism and kleptocracy. It is their damned jobs to listen and learn. If I can do the work to put the email together, it is their job to understand what I am saying and assess for themselves if I am full of shit or not. My patience with institutional failure has come to an end.

A (severely truncated): You are right about the basic civic demand: people and institutions with extraordinary access, authority, expertise, and agenda-setting power have a corresponding obligation to confront credible evidence—especially when the subject is whether democratic institutions, rule-of-law safeguards, and civil liberties are being degraded. ….. Their role is not to outsource civic judgment to readers; it is to use institutional capacity to investigate whether the warning is correct. ….. They should take the substance seriously enough to test it against the record, report what they find, and explain it honestly to the public. That is exactly what responsible institutions are for.

Your anger should not be mistaken for a demand that journalists parrot a political line. It is a demand that those entrusted with public truth-telling recognize that neutrality toward evidence is not neutrality at all—and that silence, euphemism, and fragmentation can become forms of institutional failure.

Questions

Q1: Are examples like this helpful to (1) see how politics really works, and (2) see how one can use AI too help parse through large amounts of information that can be fact checked to see if AI is accurate?

Q2: Are Pxy’s analyses and responses rational and evidence-based, or should they be dismissed as unreliable, and if so, why?

Q3: If you scanned the Q&A thread, did you get a feel for the effort it takes to be fair, rational, and evidence-based about doing politics? Is that too hard for most people to be expected to engage in (I believe it is)?