News bits: Attacking the administrative deep state; Govt. attacking privacy; Christianity attacking secularism

A NYT opinion (not behind a paywall, I think) by law professor Kate Shaw (Cardozo Law School) discusses the current attack on the entire federal government in a case now pending at the USSC:

This USSC term largely revolves around a single blockbuster question: Will our government retain the capacity to address the most pressing issues of our time?

That’s what’s at stake in a group of cases involving the power, capacity and in some instances the very existence of federal agencies, the entities responsible for carrying out so much of the work of government. .... But the administrative power cases pending before the court this term involve issues that touch the lives of every American.

They involve the government’s ability to study and approve the safety and efficacy of the drugs we take; its power to protect consumers, enforce the securities laws and safeguard the nation’s waters; and ultimately to respond in innovative ways to the climate emergency. The outcome in these cases may even affect more obvious hot-button issues like guns and abortion.

It’s been clear for some time that several conservative justices harbor deep skepticism about the administrative state.

Under the court’s current conservative supermajority, the project of dismantling the administrative state is already well underway. This has largely happened through the court’s use of what it terms the major questions doctrine, a novel principle the court has wielded to prevent agencies from taking actions of significant political or economic importance if they cannot point to explicit authorization from Congress.

Using this doctrine, last year the court kneecapped the Environmental Protection Agency by limiting its ability to enforce the Clean Air Act in West Virginia v. E.P.A. It further curtailed agency power this year in Biden v. Nebraska, when it struck down an initiative by the administration’s Department of Education that would have canceled significant quantities of student debt.

Perhaps the most important case this term is Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, scheduled for oral arguments in early 2024, in which the plaintiffs are asking the court to overrule the best-known case in administrative law, Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council. In Chevron, the court announced a rule that directed federal courts to defer to reasonable agency interpretations of statutes they administer. That is, if a statute is silent or ambiguous on a particular question, courts aren’t supposed to write on a blank slate about what the statute means — if an expert agency has already provided an answer to the question, and it’s a reasonable one, the court is supposed to defer to that interpretation.  

In the 1984 Chevron case itself, the court deferred to a Reagan-era E.P.A. rule challenged by environmentalists, and the case once counted conservative stalwarts like Justice Scalia and Justice Clarence Thomas among its defenders. (In his “dull” lecture, Justice Scalia explained that the rule of Chevron “accurately reflects the reality of government” and “adequately serves its needs.”)

But Chevron has become a bête noire [something hated or strongly disliked] in conservative circles.

I warned about the authoritarian radical right attack on the Chevron Defense before. If that legal doctrine falls, almost all of federal government will grid to a halt. People will feel a lot of pain. Some will be killed as regulations fade away and free markets running wild and butt naked takes care of us instead of the government doing it. Vast power will flow from us to brass knuckles capitalists and enraged, foaming at the mouth Christian nationalist freaks. 

Keep your eyes on the flow of power.

OT: I wrote to Shaw and asked her to stop calling elite Republican politicians, including judges, conservatives. They are not conservative. They are deeply corrupt, pro-dictatorship radical right extremists. I suspect she won’t change her labeling, but at least I did a little by pinging her mind. 

 

Quote Investigator: Currently, QI has located no substantive evidence that Edmund Burke employed this saying. Burke died in 1797, and he received credit in 1981. The earliest match located by QI appeared in the 1850 book “Elementary Sketches of Moral Philosophy” by Reverend Sydney Smith. This posthumous work was based on lectures delivered by Smith at the Royal Institution of London between 1804 and 1806. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:

It is the greatest of all mistakes, to do nothing because you can only do little: but there are men who are always clamoring for immediate and stupendous effects, ....

Fact check tip: Always check to see if a quote is properly attributed. I've made that mistake several times, but not any more (I hope).

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The federal government does not take privacy rights seriously:

US govt pays AT&T to let cops search Americans' phone records 

– 'usually' without a warrant

At least get a court order before mining Hemisphere Project data, says Senator

A senator has complained that American law enforcement agencies snoop on US citizens and residents, seemingly without regard for the privacy provisions of the Fourth Amendment, under a secret program called the Hemisphere Project that allows police to conduct searches of trillions of phone records.

According to Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), these searches "usually" happen without warrants. And after more than a decade of keeping people — lawmakers included — in the dark about Hemisphere, Wyden wants the Justice Department to reveal information about what he called a "long-running dragnet surveillance program."

"I have serious concerns about the legality of this surveillance program, and the materials provided by the DoJ contain troubling information that would justifiably outrage many Americans and other members of Congress," Wyden wrote in a letter [PDF] to US Attorney General Merrick Garland.  

AT&T declined to answer any specific questions about Hemisphere, but a spokesperson told The Register: "To be clear, any information referred to in Senator Wyden's letter would be compelled by subpoena, warrant, or court order."

If AT&T is lying, it's reasonable to believe that nothing will be done about this. Garland is worse than worthless. He does not care much about us, our rights, democracy, or the rule of law.

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This video discusses Awana (Approved Workmen Are Not Ashamed). The speaker describes Awana as a nationwide Christian nationalist child indoctrination cult. The Wikipedia page for Awana is bland and probably written by Awana to make it seem innocent. It certainly was not written by Ellie, the speaker in the video. She was raised by devout Christian parents and went through various Christian nationalist experiences for children. She has rejected Christian nationalism and posts videos on YouTube about her childhood experiences and other things.

An Awana pledge to the Christian flag

This comment to me at the reddit atheism site

put me onto Ellie, the speaker in the video

I think I've underestimated how broad, deep and intrusive Christian nationalism has been and increasingly is. ☹️

News bits: The AI war -- capitalism vs public interest; Topics for thxgvg dinner arguments; WTF!!??

What the AI fight is really about: By now it's clear that a lot of the news about AI commerce boils down to mostly or completely a single point of view: war, brass knuckles capitalism vs. the public interest. The brass knuckles capitalism vs. the public interest. The 👊 crowd condescendingly and mendaciously tell us that what's good for them is good for us. Maybe so, but from what I can tell if what's good for those elites gives them X, what most of us peons get get is ~0.01X to 0.0001X - literally zero depending who we are, wherein we means honest people who try to play the game by the rules. 

From the wealthy elite point of view, why would me or anyone else say such a horrible, terrible awful thing? Because it's true, that's why: 

2013 data

The lesson is obvious: what's good for the wealthy elites and those who claw their way into the wealthy class usually isn't very good for us because (i) power comes with wealth, (ii) low power comes with anything less than wealth, and (iii) power and wealth work in their own interests which is mostly getting more power and wealth. In my opinion, more power and wealth usually (~98% of the time) comes at the expense of the rest of us.

I posted about this a couple of days ago in a bit called The war of mindsets that control AI. I raise the same issue again. The WaPo reports about who and what Sam Altman was and still is:

Altman’s polarizing past hints at OpenAI board’s reason for firing him

Before OpenAI, Altman was asked to leave by his mentor at the prominent start-up incubator Y Combinator, part of a pattern of clashes that some attribute to his self-serving approach

Friday’s shocking ouster of Sam Altman, who negotiated his return as CEO of OpenAI late Tuesday night, was not the first time the shrewd Silicon Valley operator has found himself on the outs
Four years ago, Altman’s mentor, Y Combinator founder Paul Graham, flew from the United Kingdom to San Francisco to give his protégé the boot, according to three people familiar with the incident, which has not been previously reported.

Graham had surprised the tech world in 2014 by tapping Altman, then in his 20s, to lead the vaunted Silicon Valley incubator. Five years later, he flew across the Atlantic with concerns that the company’s president put his own interests ahead of the organization — worries that would be echoed by OpenAI’s board.

Though a revered tactician and chooser of promising start-ups, Altman had developed a reputation for favoring personal priorities over official duties and for an absenteeism that rankled his peers and some of the start-ups he was supposed to nurture, said two of the people, as well as an additional person, all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity to candidly describe private deliberations. The largest of those priorities was his intense focus on growing OpenAI, which he saw as his life’s mission, one person said.  

A separate concern, unrelated to his initial firing, was that Altman personally invested in start-ups he discovered through the incubator using a fund he created with his brother Jack — a kind of double-dipping for personal enrichment that was practiced by other founders and later limited by the organization.

“It was the school of loose management that is all about prioritizing what’s in it for me,” said one of the people.

IMFO, Altman’s polarizing past means his ruthless, brass knuckles way of doing business, even when it comes at the expense of the public interest.

In 2023 it’s clear that the plutocrat's poison daggers are fully out and looking for spines to sever in the dead of night (without much or any public knowledge). This war isn't just about foaming at the mouth Christian nationalist kleptocrat freaks trying to enslave and rape us. The other enslaving, raping monsters are dictator-loving, radical right Republican kleptocrat elites and freaks. 

Both authoritarian armies fight against democracy and inconvenient facts and truths via wars of deceit, lies, slanders and etc. They fight on two major fronts, religion and commerce. Us fragmented, disunited pro-democracy, pro-truth forces are under vicious, slanderous attack. Who is our pro-democracy General? I don’t know. It sure ain't Biden. Guess it’s mostly just us regular E-1 privates or grunts. Any Captains or Majors in the crowd? We’re in a full-blown war.

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The WaPo put together a nice list of things to fight and bicker over at thxgvg dinner:

Here are the facts to prepare you for your 

Thanksgiving arguments

Abortion

Since Roe v. Wade was overturned in June 2022, voters have supported abortion rights in six states — including red Kansas, Kentucky and Ohio. A federal appeals court ruled in August that it would restrict access to mifepristone, a widely used abortion pill, because the Food and Drug Administration did not follow the proper process in 2016 when loosening regulations to make the pill more easily available.

Presidential age

President Biden would be 82 at his second inauguration in 2025, and former president Donald Trump would be 78. Biden is the oldest president in U.S. history, and if he served a full second term from 2025 to 2029 he would be 86 when he left office; Trump would be 82.

Trump’s legal cases

Trump is the first former U.S. president to face criminal charges. He has been indicted in four criminal cases and has denied wrongdoing in each. Trump and 18 others face racketeering charges in Georgia after a leaked recording allegedly showed Trump trying to pressure Georgia’s Republican secretary of state to “find” enough votes to reverse his 2020 electoral loss. Last week, The Washington Post obtained a recording of four defendants offering previously undisclosed details about the alleged effort. Those defendants have accepted plea deals.

Border

Biden promised while campaigning not to build “another foot” of the U.S.-Mexico border wall. But in October, the administration fast-tracked the construction of roughly a dozen segments of barriers spanning 17 miles in South Texas. The Post reported that families crossing illegally hit an all-time high over the summer.

50 years of hip-hop

This year marked a half-century of hip-hop. The occasion was celebrated with jam-packed tours, parties and remembrances. Those who lived through the past 50 years have viewed its meteoric rise — from suburbanite-loathed underground music created by Black artists to the sonic backbone of current popular music. Historians argue, but the general belief is that the genre was born in 1973 at a back-to-school party that DJ Kool Herc for his sister Cindy in the Bronx. And now hip-hop plays in stores while people do their own back-to-school shopping.

Artificial intelligence

This was the year AI, or artificial intelligence, went mainstream. AI, an umbrella term for any form of technology that can perform “intelligent” tasks, has mostly been used to find patterns in huge data sets. But a boom in generative AI — which uses this pattern-matching to create words, images and sounds — has opened up new possibilities and scams. Economists took note. Companies have always turned to robots to reduce wages, reportedly even the animatronic band at Chuck E. Cheese. AI is used in many forms, including OpenAI’s ChatGPT, which has already cost some humans their jobs, and Dall-E, which has made images on the internet even less trustworthy. Speaking of jobs, Sam Altman’s dramatic dismissal as OpenAI CEO last week underscored the deep philosophical divisions in the AI world. Microsoft immediately hired him.

Inflation 

Russia-Ukraine

Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, kicking off the biggest ground war in Europe since World War II. Tens of thousands have been killed in the war. Russian President Vladimir Putin has maintained that Ukraine belongs to Moscow. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Kyiv have surprised many by holding on this long. There are concerns that Ukraine could get left behind as the United States deals with other security issues. Congress has appropriated about $113 billion to help Ukraine since Russia invaded, The Post has reported. The United States has sent armored vehicles, air defense systems, artillery, drones and more. Biden requested $106 billion in emergency foreign aid to help Ukraine hold back Russia, to support Israel’s fight against Hamas and to ward off Chinese influence.

Israel-Hamas

There’s war going on. 🤯(A 4 day ceasefire and hostage for prisoner swap starts on Friday. War resumes the following Tuesday. Let the bickering commence!)

Climate

A changing climate is making it harder to live on Earth. Hurricanes are getting stronger faster, seas are rising and wildfires are getting worse. People are doing what it takes to survive, even if that means eating dangerous water lilies in flooded parts of South Sudan. On Friday, preliminary data show, the planet creeped into a feared average temperature of more than 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above a historic norm.

Etc. 

A separate WaPo article, 5 things not to talk about at the Thanksgiving table, comments: 5. Skip the politics

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Here’s a news bit that really scares the bejezus out of me even more than it already had been scared out by Trump, MAGA and the kleptocratic, authoritarian GOP. For me, this one is a totally unexpected WTF!! moment. The Daily Beast writes:

A conservative nonprofit tied to a controversial “White House-in-waiting” for a second Donald Trump presidency [Project 2025-related] has apparently unintentionally revealed its top donors—and two of them are foundations famously associated with liberal causes.

The nonprofit, called American Compass, included the names of five donor organizations on a schedule in its 2022 tax statement, a copy of which was obtained by The Daily Beast. The page header says, “Do Not File” and “Not Open to Public Inspection,” indicating the donors may have been accidentally disclosed.

Of the five groups, two stand out for their prominent histories of supporting liberal causes—the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the Omidyar Network Foundation.

According to the tax statement, the Omidyar Network has contributed a total of $400,000 to American Compass since 2020. (In reality, Omidyar has donated $500,000, including forthcoming installments.) The Hewlett Foundation—a longtime supporter of National Public Radio—has accounted for more than one-third of American Compass’ total public support, giving a combined $1,486,000 over the same period, with an extra $475,000 dose this January.

That’s more than Hewlett gave to NPR or the Planned Parenthood Federation of America in the same timeframe.  

The donations are striking because American Compass is a partner organization in Project 2025, a controversial right-wing think tank that has been building the policy and personnel firmament for a second Trump administration.

Project 2025 is an arm of the Heritage Foundation and it has been criticized for its hard-right, authoritarian agenda—including “dehumanizing” rhetoric towards the LGBTQ community, re-upping Trump’s attempt to include citizenship on the census, leveraging the power of the Justice Department to crack down on critics, and a potentially unconstitutional plan to sic U.S. troops on domestic protesters.

Maybe I’m over-reacting here, but this indicates to me that what I thought was mostly a pro-democracy vs pro-dictatorship war probably significantly missed the mark. Instead, this evidence looks to me like we’re in what is mostly a class war of stunningly rich and powerful plutocrats and theocrats against democracy, the rule of law, civil liberties and transparency. That casts the situation differently. How many other supposed “liberal foundations” are secretly supporting the forces that are on the verge of imposing some form of kleptocratic dictatorship on American government and society?

Qs: Have I seriously misunderstood the nature of the civil war that now rages in American government and society? Or, is there really not much difference between seeing our mess as mostly America's authoritarian radical right against democracy, the rule of law, civil liberties and transparency? Does money coming from the political left to support a powerful, kleptocratic dictatorship extreme right movement make any difference? 

"Happy Thanksgiving" from a Psycho!

 

Double MAGA MAGA!! 😵

Yes, let's keep "plastering."

List of cognitive biases - 2022

This is for a reference at another site I am engaged with. 

News bits: Fascism?; Mandatory defense against the dark arts education!; DJT's open attack on justice

From Morning Joe: 

It's time fascism is called fascism and Americans 

know exactly what they're voting for

One commentator commentated: State and Federal judges must begin treating Trump like common Americans or start treating common Americans like Trump

The NYT article not paywalled off -- discussed in the video:

Trump’s Dire Words Raise New Fears About His Authoritarian Bent

The former president is focusing his most vicious attacks on domestic political opponents, setting off fresh worries among autocracy experts

Donald J. Trump rose to power with political campaigns that largely attacked external targets, including immigration from predominantly Muslim countries and from south of the United States-Mexico border.

But now, in his third presidential bid, some of his most vicious and debasing attacks have been leveled at domestic opponents.

During a Veterans Day speech, Mr. Trump used language that echoed authoritarian leaders who rose to power in Germany and Italy in the 1930s, degrading his political adversaries as “vermin” who needed to be “rooted out.”

“The threat from outside forces,” Mr. Trump said, “is far less sinister, dangerous and grave than the threat from within.”

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California law now requires K-12 teaching of defense against the dark arts in public schools: 

Pushing back against the surge of misinformation online, California will now require all K-12 students to learn media literacy skills — such as recognizing fake news and thinking critically about what they encounter on the internet.

Gov. Gavin Newsom last month signed Assembly Bill 873, which requires the state to add media literacy to curriculum frameworks for English language arts, science, math and history-social studies, rolling out gradually beginning next year. Instead of a stand-alone class, the topic will be woven into existing classes and lessons throughout the school year.

“I’ve seen the impact that misinformation has had in the real world — how it affects the way people vote, whether they accept the outcomes of elections, try to overthrow our democracy,” said the bill’s sponsor, Assemblymember Marc Berman, a Democrat from Menlo Park. “This is about making sure our young people have the skills they need to navigate this landscape.”

The new law comes amid rising public distrust in the media, especially among young people. A 2022 Pew Research Center survey found that adults under age 30 are nearly as likely to believe information on social media as they are from national news outlets. Overall, only 7% of adults have “a great deal” of trust in the media, according to a Gallup poll conducted last year.  

“The increase in Holocaust denial, climate change denial, conspiracy theories getting a foothold, and now AI … all this shows how important media literacy is for our democracy right now,” said Jennifer Ormsby, library services manager for the Los Angeles County Office of Education. “The 2016 election was a real eye-opener for everyone on the potential harms and dangers of fake news.”

“Media literacy is a basic part of being literate. If we’re just teaching kids how to read, and not think critically about what they’re reading, we’re doing them a disservice.” 
AB 873 passed nearly unanimously in the Legislature, underscoring the nonpartisan nature of the topic. 

Nationwide, Texas, New Jersey and Delaware have also passed strong media literacy laws, and more than a dozen other states are moving in that direction, according to Media Literacy Now, a nonprofit research organization that advocates for media literacy in K-12 schools.

Still, California’s law falls short of Media Literacy Now’s recommendations. California’s approach doesn’t include funding to train teachers, an advisory committee, input from librarians, surveys or a way to monitor the law’s effectiveness.

This is long overdue and minimal, but better than nothing. As I posted about in 2019, Finland has been subject to decades of relentless, severe Russian dark free speech attacks. Russian governments have been intent on poisoning and pacifying Finland's society to make it compliant with Russian demands. In response, Finland adopted a nationwide education program for all people, children and adults, to defend themselves against the dark free speech arts. That program has been significantly effective. The US now desperately needs the same kind of program.

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Business Insider reports about an effort by DJT to openly and directly attack witnesses against him in the federal insurrection lawsuit against him for his 1/6 coup attempt:

A panel of three judges on Monday appeared highly skeptical of arguments from Donald Trump's legal team seeking to revoke a gag order that bars him from attacking potential witnesses in his election interference criminal case.

D. John Sauer, Trump's attorney in the hearing before the United States Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit, took a highly expansive view of the former president's First Amendment rights.

Depending on "the context," Sauer argued, Trump would be permitted to pressure possible witnesses not to cooperate with prosecutors.

Judge Patricia Millet, an Obama appointee on the panel, repeatedly pressed Sauer to explain if Trump could ever be restricted from saying anything. She appeared annoyed when he avoided articulating any such standard.

"So is it your position that if he communicates through a social media post: 'Hey, Witness X, I know the prosecutor is bothering you, trying to get you to say bad things about me — be a patriot, don't act treasonously, don't cooperate'—" she began to ask Sauer.

Sauer interrupted the judge, saying it would "depend on the context" if it would be OK for Trump to pressure a witness in a public setting, and declined to answer the question directly.

After several minutes of back-and-forth with the judge — What if it was a "fair response" to something Witness X said? What if it was in the "political arena"? What if it was about former Vice President Mike Pence, who until recently challenged Trump for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination? — Sauer finally conceded that there were possible circumstances where Trump would be violating the order.  

Trump's attorneys have sought to get rid of the gag order entirely, arguing that it infringes on his First Amendment rights, which they say is particularly heightened since he is the frontrunner for the Republican nomination in the 2024 presidential election. Chutkan scheduled a trial for March.

"What they've described as 'threats' is actually, under the Supreme Court's jurisprudence, pure political speech," Sauer said. "It is rough and tumble, it is hard-hitting in many situations, but it absolutely is core political speech."

DJT is clear that he has abandoned all respect for our law enforcement and legal systems if they are applied against him. It is also clear that he will use those systems to attack and persecute his enemies and annoyances, real or perceived. DJT wants to publicly attack and intimidate witnesses into silence or perjury to subvert justice for himself. 

DJT is a vicious dictator, pure and simple. If people cannot see the gravity and urgency of the threat by now, it's unclear what could wake them up.

How does the public view election deniers?

https://publicwise.org/publication/how-does-the-public-view-election-deniers/

Key Takeaways

• A strong majority of self-identified moderate, liberal and progressive registered voters say they are less likely to vote for an election denier. 
• Conversely, conservative voters say they are more likely than not to vote for a candidate labeled an election denier.
• The overwhelming majority of Americans have heard common election denier claims about voting and elections.
• Despite this prevalence, there is no clear consensus on what election denier means to the average registered voter. That did not stop the majority from saying they are less likely to vote for one. 
• Because the election denier label has not gained a solid, agreed upon definition, there is an opportunity for defenders of democracy to shape and broaden the narrative.
• Up to 14% of progressive voters believe some election denier claims, suggesting pro-democracy candidates would benefit from efforts to guard against susceptibility to conspiracy claims even among progressive and liberal base voters.

The persistence of election denialism and election denying candidates 

During the 2020 election cycle, then President Donald Trump began to cast doubt on the outcome of the election before voting had even begun. Following Joe Biden’s election, Trump and his supporters continued to cast doubt on the results, despite evidence that the 2020 election was the most secure in recent history. This burgeoning election denialism movement culminated in the violent insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, resulting in five deaths, nearly 1,000 arrests, and the largest investigation in U.S. history. 

In the 2022 midterms, a swath of candidates up and down the ballot embraced election denialism as a rallying campaign cry premised on the “Big Lie” of election fraud. Although most election denying candidates did not win their elections for state-wide positions, a majority overall won their races, including to the U.S. House and to many state legislatures and local offices around the country.  

These wins demonstrate the extent to which election denialism has found a foothold in American politics, both among elected representatives and the voting public. We should expect the election denying platform will continue to persist into the coming 2024 Presidential election. 

But will Americans vote for election deniers? And what does calling someone an “election denier” candidate mean to the general public? 

At Public Wise, we wanted to know more about how Americans understand election deniers and election denialism more broadly. Specifically, what characteristics do they believe most accurately describe an election denier? What election denial rhetoric have voters heard and to what extent do they believe it is true? And, can voters be persuaded to vote for a candidate widely portrayed as an election denier? 

In this analysis, we draw from our nationally representative survey of registered voters conducted from April 13-19th, 2023. We asked questions related to views of election deniers and election denial rhetoric, beliefs about democracy, threats to democracy, and opinions about current political issues.¹

In this first installment of our new Democracy and Election Deniers series, we delve into whether Americans are willing to vote for an “election denier,” to what extent they are familiar with election denial talking points, and what they think “election denier” refers to.

Willingness to vote for election denying candidates

Are people willing to vote for a candidate who has been characterized as an election denier? 

The answer seems to depend on ideology. Progressives and liberals overwhelmingly report that they are less likely to vote for an election denier. The majority of moderates, at 57%, also say they are less likely to vote for a candidate who has been characterized as an election denier. Meanwhile, only 17% of conservatives say they are less likely and a full 40% report conversely that they are more likely (19% somewhat more and 21% much more) to vote for such a candidate. 

While there is a lot of certainty on the left side of the political spectrum, there is less so in the middle and on the right. Almost a third of moderates and more than 40% of conservatives report that they are not sure if they would vote for a candidate who has been widely characterized as an election denier. This suggests that the election denier label will have different strategic uses for candidates and their campaigns depending on the voters they are trying to sway.

How conspicuous are election denier claims and who believes them? 

The majority of registered voters said that they are less likely to vote for a candidate who has been widely characterized as an election denier in general. But how prevalent are election denier claims and what kinds of voters believe them? 

We asked about five common election denier claims. We found exposure to election denial rhetoric is widespread, but belief in election denial rhetoric is split along ideological lines.²

Virtually all registered voters report having heard election denier rhetoric of some kind, but some claims appear to be more believable than others. Slightly over half (53%) of all respondents found it believable that there are places where it is easy for ineligible people to cast ballots, and 50% of all respondents found it believable that vote by mail makes it easier for people to commit fraud and that poll workers in certain states help rig elections. 

Most conservatives find all election denier claims believable. Moderates are more likely to believe each claim compared to progressives, but less likely to believe them compared to conservatives. 

A small but substantial share of liberals and progressives found some election denier claims to be believable. 13% of progressives and 20% of liberals find the claim that there are some places where it is easy for ineligible people to cast ballots to be believable. 

Another 14% of progressives and 19% of liberals find it believable that poll workers in certain states help rig elections.

What are the defining characteristics of election deniers? 

Registered voters have largely heard election denial rhetoric and the majority report they are less likely to vote for a candidate who has been characterized as an election denier, but do they have a common understanding of what it means to be an election denier? It seems like the answer is no. This may reflect a combination of factors, including the fact that across plenty of media coverage referring to election deniers the term is being used to describe many different behaviors with very little overlap across sources and that election deniers themselves have engaged in many combinations of these behaviors. 

In their definition of election deniers, The Washington Post includes people who questioned Biden’s victory (e.g. Belief in the Big Lie of election fraud), opposed counting electoral votes, and sought to overturn the 2020 election. 

Many of these characteristics correspond to a variety of other anti-democratic views, but the full range of beliefs and behaviors the public associates with those labeled as election deniers remains unclear.

For example, election deniers have been broadly characterized as believing in and spreading conspiracy theories and false claims about voter fraud. But they also cast doubt on legitimate voting options such as vote by mail, claiming – without evidence – it is a mechanism for widespread voter fraud. These claims about voter fraud are then used to justify support for voter suppression legislation. 

In fact, the Brennan Center for Justice released a “playbook” of election denier candidates, pointing to a number of strategies they tend to employ, including spreading misinformation, efforts to suppress votes, threatening poll workers, discrediting voting machines, and undermining vote-by-mail. 

Given the scope of election denier characteristics, their tendency to support voter suppression, and the conspicuousness of their claims in the wider media landscape, we wanted to know whether any of these other descriptions – above and beyond denying the 2020 election results – are salient for voters as accurate portrayals of election denier candidates. 

In our survey, we asked participants to assess whether the following five statements about someone labeled an election denier are always true, sometimes true, never true, or not sure: 

• An election denier does not believe Joe Biden legitimately won the 2020 election 
• An election denier supports legislation that makes it harder for eligible American citizens to vote
• An election denier refuses to accept the results of elections they disagree with
• An election denier spreads disinformation regarding voting and elections
• An election denier believes voter fraud occurs frequently enough to skew election results 

Slightly more than half of registered voters claim two characteristics are “always true” of election deniers: that they do not believe Joe Biden legitimately won the 2020 election (57%) and they believe voter fraud happens frequently enough to skew election results (51%).

The extent to which respondents felt each of the five descriptors applied to election deniers varied widely by partisan ideology.³ Between 60-78% of liberals and progressives responded “always true” for all items, while roughly half or less of all conservative respondents said “always true” for all items. Similar to views on accountability for January 6th, these wide ideological splits are obscured by the overall average. 

Despite being a common campaign message of election denier candidates, only 65% of progressives and 68% of liberals said it is “always true” that election deniers believe voter fraud occurs frequently enough to skew election results, compared to 43% of moderates and 39% of conservatives. 

The description garnering the largest share of progressives and liberals claiming it is “always true” is that election deniers refuse to accept the results of elections they disagree with. On the other hand, there was no one election denier description that was “always true” for the majority of conservatives. The statement that election deniers do not believe Biden legitimately won in 2020 came closest with 46% of conservatives saying it is always true. 

There is also ideological disagreement about the extent to which election deniers support voter suppression legislation: 60% of both liberals and progressives said it is “always true” that election deniers support legislation that make it harder for eligible citizens to vote, while 63% of conservatives said this is “never true” of election deniers. 27% of moderates thought this is always true of election deniers, while another 28% thought it is never true. 

These results show that while most registered voters have heard some form of election denial rhetoric, there is not one clear definition of election denier that resonates with the American public, and the characteristics that ring most true differ across ideological lines. Despite this lack of clear definition, the majority of registered voters still said they were less likely to vote for an election denier.

Looking ahead: clearly communicate the election denier agenda and how it harms democracy

Although election denialism was a decisive issue of the 2022 midterms, our findings suggest that registered voters do not have a consistent picture of what an election denier looks like. In our survey, barely more than half (57%) said that it is always true that an election denier is someone who does not believe that Biden legitimately won the 2020 election, despite many news organizations widely agreeing on that as a condition for labeling someone an election denier.⁴ 

While the 2022 elections are over, the broader election denial movement is not. At the top of the ticket, Trump has already entered the 2024 race with early polling suggesting he leads other candidates by a wide margin. And he’s not the only election denier running for office. Many election deniers currently in office will be running for reelection and many others will try to take new positions, including those that directly oversee election administration.

Moreover, in the nearly three years since the 2020 election and insurrection that followed, the election denial movement and its implications have grown far beyond the lie that Trump won the 2020 election. Much of the rhetoric used to push this lie relied on false claims about the security of US elections, including lies about voter fraud, vote by mail, poll workers, electronic voting machines, and ballot counting procedures. The post-2020 election denier playbook builds on these lies with an agenda designed to limit voting by mail, complicate the counting of votes with things like hand count requirements and audits, and change who controls the certification of results. These lies have also been used to justify voter suppression legislation, even in states like Georgia where Republican officials defied Trump’s demands to find him the votes he needed to win the 2020 election.     

As we move closer to 2024, the urgency of communicating these goals – and the harm that comes with them – continues to grow. Our data suggest that, in addition to many not thinking it is always true that election deniers reject Biden’s legitimate win in 2020, many Americans also remain unaware of other key features of election denialism. Only about half said it is always true that election deniers believe fraud skews election results (51%) and that election deniers refuse to accept the results of elections they disagree with (49%). Only 40% said it’s always true that election deniers spread disinformation about voting, and even fewer, 33%, said it’s always true that election deniers support voter suppression legislation.

The upside for democracy is that election deniers and the key claims of their movement remain unpopular among many Americans. While their rhetoric is widespread in the sense that almost everyone has heard their lies about elections and voting, belief in these lies is not widespread, especially among Democrats, left-leaning Independents, and a sizable share of moderates. Many also say they are much less likely to vote for someone who has been widely characterized as an election denier, including 92% of progressives, 83% of liberals, and 48% of moderates. 

However, because many Americans remain unfamiliar with the key provisions of the election denier platform, there is an opportunity for defenders of democracy to broaden the narrative beyond denial of the 2020 election to encompass the bigger story of how these election denial behaviors fit into a broad threat to our democratic systems, particularly by explicitly connecting the lies about elections and voting to the candidates that seek to be in positions of power, especially those directly overseeing election administration.