Johnson Congratulates Himself On The Magical Disappearance Of Non-Citizen Voting

WASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 12: U.S. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks during a news conference on the results of the 2024 election outside of the U.S. Capitol Building on November 12, 2024 in Washington,... WASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 12: U.S. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks during a news conference on the results of the 2024 election outside of the U.S. Capitol Building on November 12, 2024 in Washington, DC. Lawmakers returned to Washington today for a lame-duck session after Republicans took control of the Senate and appear poised to keep control of the House, giving President-elect Donald Trump full control over the next Congress. (Photo by Andrew Harnik/Getty Images) MORE LESS
Start your day with TPM.
Sign up for the Morning Memo newsletter

For months now, Republicans have been setting the stage to cry voter fraud in the event of a possible Donald Trump loss — warning specifically about the supposed dangers of non-citizens voting. 

However, unsurprisingly, outrage over non-citizens supposedly voting en masse for Democrats, and general, run-of-the-mill claims of voter fraud, have practically disappeared since Trump’s victory in last week’s election. 

Instead, when asked about the issue, Republicans have been pushing the false narrative that the only reason supposed non-citizen voting did not disrupt last week’s election is because GOP lawmakers, learning from the “chaos” of the 2020 election, passed legislation to protect against this threat — an argument barely rooted in reality. 

During a press briefing on Tuesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) addressed a question from a reporter about how non-citizen voting impacted last week’s election, by crediting Republicans for ostensibly eradicating the issue after states passed legislation “to shore up their systems” and protect against this supposed threat.  

Johnson also said that the election was simply “too big to rig,” referencing a frequently repeated line from Trump.

“It is a fact that non-citizens voted in some places around the country…” he said. “I had confidence that because of the chaos related to the 2020 election, most of the states got busy, legislatures in the states got busy and passed legislation to shore up their systems in states around the country.”

The Republican obsession with the non-existent threat of non-citizen voting will likely be used again to stoke fear about the safety and integrity of the election system in future elections, as it was this cycle. Johnson himself put forward irrelevant legislation that passed the House this summer that would ban non-citizens from voting in federal elections, something that is already illegal and barely happens. The bill was dead on arrival in the Senate.  

Last week, voters approved Republican-backed measures in Idaho, Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Wisconsin, enshrining in those states’ constitutions that it is, in fact, illegal for non-citizens to vote in elections. This is something that is already illegal in these 8 states, and at the federal level. But that did not stop Republicans from creating an environment of hysteria around the issue ahead of the election last week.

“Instead of this being about evidence and facts … the whole thing is just weaponized basically to justify … your side should always win and should always have the stay in power and so on,” said Yotam Ophir, a professor of communication at the University at Buffalo who focuses on misinformation and extremism.

Johnson is not the only one trying to rewrite history in the face of  Trump’s win. 

“Voter fraud claims disappeared immediately,” Darrell West, senior fellow in the Center for Technology Innovation within the Governance Studies program at the Brookings Institute, told TPM. “As soon as Trump started to win, the Republicans did not want to discredit their own victory, so suddenly it became a free and fair election.”

Early on Election Day, before Trump’s victory became apparent, Trump baselessly claimed that there was “massive cheating” in Philadelphia. The Philadelphia District Attorney quickly shut down the “unfounded claim,” saying there is no “factual basis” for the claim and that the allegation itself was “wild.” Since Trump won the election, of course, there hasn’t been another word on the supposed “massive cheating” scandal that plagued Philadelphia. 

Although the usual Stop the Steal voices have been quiet about the integrity of the 2024 election, they have used Trump’s victory to somehow prove that there was in fact fraud in the 2020 election. 

The conspiracy theorist behind the widely debunked  film “2000 Mules” Dinesh D’Souza, for example, was quick to claim in a viral post on X that “15 million Democratic votes appeared in 2020 and immediately disappeared after that.” Another viral post on X also highlighted the number of votes Joe Biden received in 2020, claiming that the 2020 election was therefore “rigged.”

“We continue to see from sore losers, false allegations of fraud without any evidence,” Eliza Sweren-Becker, senior counsel for the Voting Rights and Elections Program at the Brennan Center for Justice, told TPM. “I think the attempt to disaggregate certain races and then claim fraud is reflective of, again, what we’ve been talking about, which is partisan motivation for false allegations of fraud and not anything related to fact or evidence.”

Latest News

Notable Replies

  1. So, yeah, since I’m first… well. Obligatory:

    That is, why not just say this magic rock that repels tigers also stopped illegal-immigrant voter fraud while you’re at it, jackass?

  2. During a press briefing on Tuesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) addressed a question from a reporter about how non-citizen voting impacted last week’s election, by crediting Republicans for ostensibly eradicating the issue after states passed legislation “to shore up their systems” and protect against this supposed threat.

    This is the flip side of Josh’s latest Backchannel post, where he concludes that understanding why things happened is the first step to addressing them.

    You make the best decisions when you start from an accurate understanding of what happened. You don’t gain any psychic points or merit by exaggeration or falsehood. It may feel like that but it’s not the case.

    I agree with Josh’s point that that is the best way to move forward, but the GOP tried that briefly in 2013 with their “post-mortem” that was immediately “mortemed” by Trump. You can either stop and reflect and gain a better understanding of the situation, or you can just slam that round peg at that square hole harder, until something breaks. The Democrats are inclined toward the first solution, while the Republicans are completely enthralled by the second one.

  3. That is, why not just say this magic rock that repels tigers also stopped illegal-immigrant voter fraud while you’re at it, jackass?
    … … …
    Magic rock makes face eating leopard disappear

  4. People get ready theres a train a comin’…you dont need a ticket you just get on board…realistically we missed our chance and the train…get ready for blood on the tracks…nothing to stop the lies and malfeasance now…look whose in the mix already merely a week removed from disaster.

  5. So in MO the state constitutional Amendment was #7. There was three parts to this amendment-

    1. making it state law that only citizens of the US can vote.
    2. prohibit rank choice voting.
    3. require the plurality winner of a political party primary to be the single candidate at the general election.

    The third one made me scratch my head. It passed 68.4 % while the amendment to make abortion legal in MO only won with 51.6%.

Continue the discussion at forums.talkingpointsmemo.com

11 more replies

Participants

Avatar for system1 Avatar for zandru Avatar for sysprog Avatar for epicurus Avatar for sparrowhawk Avatar for lastroth Avatar for fiftygigs Avatar for darrtown Avatar for benthere Avatar for zlohcuc Avatar for junebug Avatar for chicago11 Avatar for nobiru Avatar for marelimal Avatar for bcgister Avatar for shannon_spencer_fox Avatar for photoglyphics

Continue Discussion
Masthead Masthead
Founder & Editor-in-Chief:
Executive Editor:
Managing Editor:
Deputy Editor:
Editor at Large:
General Counsel:
Publisher:
Head of Product:
Director of Technology:
Associate Publisher:
Front End Developer:
Senior Designer: