Donald Trump claims he lost the popular vote due to millions of 'illegal' votes - but is there any truth to it?

Donald Trump claims he lost the popular vote due to millions of 'illegal' votes - but is there any truth to it?

Donald Trump, the president-elect of the United States of America, has claimed that his loss to Hillary Clinton in the popular vote was down to significant numbers of people voting "illegally".

The latest results show that - despite winning in the all-important electoral college - Trump lost out to Clinton by 2.2 million ballots in total.

This, along with a move by Green party candidate Jill Stein to stage recounts in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, seems to have riled the President-elect.

Posting on Twitter yesterday afternoon, the man set to be the United States' 45th president came out fighting, claiming that he only lost out in popular terms because of widespread "illegal" voting.

He followed this initial tweet by claiming that there had been "serious voter fraud in Virginia, New Hampshire and California - so why isn't the media reporting on this? Serious bias - big problem!"

The notion that voter fraud is widespread has been a frequent refrain from Trump's camp during the road to the White House.

And it isn't just Trump who takes this point of view, with many Republicans also espousing that voter fraud is a problem. As many as 20 states have passed new voting legislation since 2012, with many of these new laws raising the bar on the amount of identification required to cast a ballot.

In addition to winning the Electoral College in a landslide, I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 27, 2016
This view has filtered through to the public with a Washington Post/ABC News poll from September finding that nearly half of voters thought that electoral fraud occurs very or somewhat often.

Could Trump's claim be right? Well, no.

Given the consistency with which voter fraud is cited by the Republican party we decided to try and prove them right and looked for evidence that 1.1 million votes - the number required to swing the popular vote to Trump - could have been the result of election fraud.

Suffice it to say we failed miserably in this quest.

A study by the Carnegie-Knight News21 program in 2012 sent official requests to all 50 US states asking for all electoral fraud cases going back to the year 2000.

After compiling hundreds of documents they found that just 2,068 cases of such fraud had been recorded and that, of this number, 46 per cent hadn't resulted in any form of prosecution.

Much more, including those graphs that some of you love. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/11/28/donald-trump-claims-lost-popular-vote-due-millions-illegal-votes/

All I know is Trump promised the election would be rigged. Obviously he knew something the rest of us did not. In fairness to him, and the American people, we must have a recount in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, and anyplace else he wants.

The people have spoken...

I think a recount is necessary.

eddie wrote:I think a recount is necessary.

It would be unprecedented (but so is everything else in this election).

This is bad for western democracy.  To recount and redo the elections would be to open the possibility that democracy can be electronically rigged.  To not do so is to concede that democracy is open to illegitimacy and  fraud.

However, there is something to be said about finality.  In law, we have statutes of limitations and other jurisdictional limitations because at some point we must move on.  As a people, and as a political entity, we must sometime say this is what the law or system says or is.

But, if we get it wrong, why even hold elections?  If we are dependent upon a system that can be rigged, why not just dispense with the system altogether?  Isn't it just adherence to a charade?

I think we've at least got to get to the bottom of it.  It doesn't help to turn the issue into a political issue, where it's just a matter of whose ox got gored.  I think that's the cheap answer, and it doesn't solve anything.  What about next time?  If it worked once, I can guarantee it will happen again...until the system gets fixed.

So I think opening up the question, and bringing in experts is a good step.