The “Stop the Steal” conspiracy theory claims that voter fraud caused Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss. Despite investigations debunking it, the theory spread widely and spurred the January 6 Capitol riot by Trump supporters attempting to overturn the legal election results.
“In our nation’s 248-year history, there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump,” former Republican Vice President Dick Cheney said in a statement in September 2024, referred by The Guardian. “He tried to steal the last election using lies and violence to keep himself in power after the voters had rejected him. He can never be trusted with power again.
“As citizens, we each have a duty to put country above partisanship to defend our constitution. That is why I will be casting my vote for Vice-President Kamala Harris”, Cheney stated.
Russian actors made false video promoting the “stop the steal” conspiracy theory
According to a joint statement fro the US Intelligence Community, a viral “video that falsely depicted an individual ripping up ballots” was “manufactured and amplified” by Russian actors.
The statement of October 25. 2024 said “This Russian activity is part of Moscow’s broader effort to raise unfounded questions about the integrity of the US election and stoke divisions among Americans”, and that “In the lead up to election day and in the weeks and months after, the IC expects Russia to create and release additional media content that seeks to undermine trust in the integrity of the election and divide Americans.”
The origin of the “Stop the steal” conspiracy theory
A mob of right wing extremists stormed the Congress, trying to stop the democratic process by violence. 5 people were killed. Among them police officer Brian Sicknick.
Before the Capitol Siege 6. January Trump held a speech where he among other falsely claimed that a conspiracy of Democrats had cheated in the election, presented in full by ABC News: “In every single swing state local officials, state officials almost all Democrats made illegal and unconstitutional changes to election procedures without the mandated approvals by the state legislatures that these changes paved the way for fraud on a scale never seen before, and I think we would go a long way outside of our country when I say that.”
Trump then told his supporters to the Capitol to stop Vice President Mike Pence conforming the election count after the election. “Go to the Capitol, and we are going to try and give–the Democrats are hopeless, they are never voting for anything, not even one vote but we are going to try–give our Republicans, the weak ones because the strong ones don’t need any of our help, we’re try–going to try and give them the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country.”. When you catch somebody in a fraud, you are allowed to go by very different rules. So I hope Mike has the courage to do what he has to do, and I hope he doesn’t listen to the RINOs and the stupid people that he’s listening to.” (RINO is a nickname used by the right wing about republicans they do not find radical enough, “Republican in name only”).
Associated Press wrote: “At various times, Trump and his legal team falsely alleged that voting machines were built in Venezuela at the direction of President Hugo Chavez, who died in 2013; that machines were designed to delete or flip votes cast for Trump; and that the U.S. Army had seized a computer server in Germany that held secrets to U.S. voting irregularities. None of those claims was ever substantiated or corroborated. CISA’s joint statement released after the election said, “There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes or was in any way compromised.””
All these claims have been falsified by thorough investigations. But they are still repeated. Associated Press reported in August 2023 that 57 % of republicans still believed that Biden’s election was illegitimate. Which shows that the truth content is unimportant for wether a conspiracy theory is widely circulated.
This conspiracy theory served as motive for the Capitol siege. See also the “Kraken” meme in chapter 9 about the “stop the steal” conspiracy theory.
The only evidence of attempt of election fraud points back to Donald Trump, who phoned to persuade Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffentsberger to overturn the election in the state.
A full transcript and audio of the phone call is published by CNN:
“All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have because we won the state. And flipping the state is a great testament to our country”, Trump said.
The “Stop the steal” story originated from a disinformation campaign by Trump aide Roger Stone in 2016. Stone’s political action committee launched a “Stop the Steal” website in 2016.
The story was supposed to be used against a probable Hillary Clinton win. But Trump won in 2016, so there was no need for the narrative at that time.
When Trump lost the election in 2020 this story was relaunched and used to motivate the attack on the Congress. A clip of a movie by Christoffer Gulbrandsen shows how Roger Stone relaunched a claim of the “stop the steal” campaign as early as 9 July 2020. But an election fraud could not have taken place at this point. Because the “Stop the steal” campaign was relaunched 4 months before the election, which was in November 2020.
Vice President Mike Pence did not bow to the insurgents demands to overturn the election, and affirmed Joe Bidens win the monday after the capitol siege. “Vice President Mike Pence defied President Donald Trump early Thursday morning as he affirmed President-elect Joe Biden’s November victory, putting an end to Trump’s futile efforts to subvert American democracy and overturn the results of the election”, Associated Press wrote.
The supreme court has ruled that Trump can not be prosecuted. As a president Trump installed three judges judges loyal to him into the supreme court. By this, the supreme court had a republican majority. Reuters reported that «The justices, in a 6-3 ruling authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, threw out a lower court’s decision that had rejected Trump’s claim of immunity from federal criminal charges involving his efforts to undo his 2020 election loss to Joe Biden. The six conservative justices were in the majority, while its three liberal members dissented.»
Wandering story falsely telling “insurgents had no guns”
A wandering story claiming that the 6. January insurgents did not have guns have been pushed by Donald Trump, Robert Kennedy JR and Fox news anchor Tucker Carlson. Fact checks from Politifact CNN and NPR including court documents conclude that this story is false. Robert Kennedy later retracted the claim because he had learned that it was incorrect. CBS News reported about the violence and the considerable amount of weapons used.
Congress members were seconds away from being trapped by the mob shouting that they would hang Vice President Mike Pence. Donald Trump called the storming of the Congress, where several people where killed, a “day of love” in a meeting 17. October, The Guardian refers. Trump referenced his claim to the false “stop the steal” conspiracy theory, saying that “they thought the election was a rigged election”. Trump promoted a false wandering story, that against the enormous amount of evidence claimed that the riots were not violent: “Nothing done wrong at all,” BBC cites Trump.
Trump usually tries to distance himself from the capitol siege, but used “we” form in this occasion, admitting that he was a part of the insurrection.
“There were no guns down there. We didn’t have guns. The others had guns, but we didn’t have guns. And when I say we, these are people that walked down — this was a tiny percentage of the overall which nobody sees and nobody, nobody shows. But that was a day of love.”