'Ugly consequences' of 'core tenet of Republican ideology' in spotlight after GA ruling: expert

Earlier this week, a Georgia court smacked down a voter group's claims of 2020 election voter fraud across the state, which comes as Donald Trump still faces his Fulton County criminal case over his election interference efforts.

In a Sunday, February 18 op-ed for MSNBC, author and political commentator Paul Waldman emphasizes the former president isn’t the only right-wing fabulist who has learned that when you enter a courtroom, rules matter."

The author of White Rural Rage: The Threat to American Democracy writes:

Though the claims may be widely believed by the devoted and the deluded, when it comes time to actually challenge the outcome of an election, they fail. In the Georgia case, True the Vote had filed a claim with the state in late 2021 alleging that the organization 'spoke with several individuals regarding personal knowledge, methods, and organizations involved in ballot trafficking in Georgia.' They even said they had one anonymous individual who 'admitted to personally participating and provided specific information about the ballot trafficking process.'

Waldman also notes:

Those are some blockbuster allegations. So the state of Georgia opened an investigation, and asked True the Vote for evidence, including the name of this ballot trafficker so they could interview the person. Last summer, fed up with waiting for True the Vote to turn over corroboration, the Georgia attorney general asked a judge to compel the group to share its proof. Finally, in a court filing — more than two years after its initial complaint — True the Vote admitted it is unable to supply evidence for its charges.

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Waldman points out that "lies" about voter fraudy yield a "panoply of ugly consequences," such as "harassment and death threats" towards election workers."

He emphasizes, despite the fact "that the right’s voter fraud fraudsters lose just about every time they have to supply proof of their claims in a courtroom doesn’t mean this mania has been defeated," noting, "The bogus idea that voter fraud is rampant in American elections has become a core tenet of Republican ideology, almost as important as a belief that taxes are too high, immigrants are violent and abortion must be prohibited."

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Waldman's full op-ed can be read here.