Teaching Trump’s 2020 election lies turns civics into propaganda | Opinion – Cincinnati Enquirer

This fall, if you’re a high school student in Oklahoma, you will be taught in history class that the Democrats stole the 2020 presidential election from Donald Trump. Though disproven by numerous recounts and over 60 court cases in multiple states, the Republican-led Oklahoma Department of Education is requiring that this debunked conspiracy theory be taught as fact. Yes, boys and girls, we have now reached that point in fascist dogma where we start rewriting history to serve the agenda of Dear Leader. 

Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

For four-and-a-half years now, Trump and his disciples have been claiming the 2020 election was rigged and that he won. And yet, in all that time, no one − not Trump, not Tucker Carlson, not Sean Hannity, not Steve Bannon, not even the MyPillow Guy (Mike Lindell) − has ever been able to explain, step-by-step, how it was done. As former New York City Mayor and disbarred lawyer Rudy Giuliani admitted to the judge in one of the 60-odd court filings lost by the Trump campaign: “We have no evidence, but we have lots of theories… .” 

Very well. Let’s examine some of those theories.

“The voting machines were hacked.” 

On the face of it, this seems very believable. Every day, we read about cyber-crooks hacking into and commandeering computers. But voting machines are not the same as personal computers. They are simple tabulating machines. They have no modems and are not connected to the internet, so it’s impossible to hack them. It would be like trying to call someone who doesn’t have a phone.

“The ballot boxes were stuffed.” 

(This includes people voting multiple times, dead people or illegal immigrants voting, or suitcases full of fraudulent ballots being slipped into the counting centers.)

Fifty years ago, before government records were computerized, it might have been possible to slip a few dead or fake names onto voting lists. But now, cross-referencing of death certificates, property transfers and other government documents allows for voter rolls to be cleaned up daily. And it should be obvious to anyone who has ever voted just how ridiculous Trump’s claims are when he says, “People are changing their hats and coats and voting over and over again.”

Elections aren’t raffles. You can’t just walk into any precinct on Election Day and fill out a ballot. You have to register first, and give your name and address and birth certificate or other identification information (all of which is cross-referenced with tax records, death records, etc.), after which you are assigned a specific precinct where you have to vote. (Your mail-in ballot also goes to that specific precinct.) So if a precinct with 2,000 registered voters has 3,000 votes cast (or even 2001), it would be immediately obvious that something was amiss, and an investigation would be launched. 

In 2020, not a single precinct in the entire country reported more votes tallied than there were registered voters in that precinct. 

“The voting machines were rigged.” 

This is one of the sillier theories, for it’s the software (the program with the ballot on it), not the machine itself, that would have to be rigged, and the ballots are created by the various states. The very notion that any multi-billion-dollar company would risk utter ruin by taking part in a conspiracy that could be discovered by any computer expert, is so ridiculous that FOX News hosts mocked the allegations in their private texts as “insane lies” and “mind blowingly nuts,” yet nonetheless promoted the lie on air (as did Newsmax and OAN). All three networks have subsequently paid out massive defamation settlements to both Dominion and Smartmatic Corporations, manufacturers of the voting machines.

In short, none of the 2020 election fraud conspiracies stand up to even the most cursory examination.  They are just lies spewed out for Trump’s loyal supporters who want to believe them. George Orwell warned of the consequences when a society values ideology over truth, and no matter how much Oklahoma Republicans want to believe Trump’s “Big Lie,” altering history is never a good idea. Just ask Winston Smith.

Keith Thompson lives in Fort Thomas, Ky., and is a historian and author of “2024,” a political thriller set against the background of the 2024 election.

This story was updated to add a video.