Name: BUSTED? Why the numbers behind Mitch McConnell’s re-election don’t add up
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BUSTED? Why the numbers behind Mitch McConnell’s re-election don’t add up

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RED BARBLUE BAROn a Thursday in August in Louisville, months before the 2020 election, a parade of cars filled with Kentucky Teamster representatives and labor groups, showed their constant blocking of critical COVID aid. They drove by McConnell’s office raucously honking and bearing signs saying “Mitch better have my money.”In 2017, a asked Kentuckians, “Do you approve or disapprove of Senator Mitch McConnell’s job performance?” Only 18% approved. He clawed his rating back up to 39% on the eve of the election.ADVERTISEMENTMcConnell, leader of Senate Republicans, rarely holds town hall meetings with Kentucky voters—not since a went viral.1 out of 5 voters appear to have filled out their ballots with votes for both the female Democratic Amy McGrath and the Republican pussy-grabber Donald Trump.So, what exactly drove these angry Kentuckians to reelect Mitch McConnell with a 19-point advantage over opponent Amy McGrath—57.8% to 38.2%?Even as Republicans across the country still insist that the election was rife with fraudulent Democratic votes, no one’s asking how McConnell managed one of the most lopsided landslides of the Nov. 3 election. They should. An investigation of Kentucky voting results by DCReport raises significant questions about the vote tallies in McConnell’s state.The 2020 Kentucky U.S. Senate election results mapADVERTISEMENTDCReport focused on the results in three counties in eastern Kentucky’s Appalachian Mountains, two of which Democrats usually always win, but similar patterns emerge in other counties across the state. Even in counties that , there were a staggering number of Democrats voting Republican in 2020.In rural Breathitt County, for instance, there are . The county has a history of close contests, but Amy McGrath got only 1,652 votes versus 3,738 for McConnell, a 67% to 29% trouncing. McGrath’s votes, if accurate, equaled only 17% of registered Democrats in Breathitt County.Conventional political wisdom in McConnell-land holds that these days “ancestral Kentucky Democrats” vote Republican, and analysts shouldn’t correlate party registration with voting patterns. But simply dismissing any anomalies based on anecdotal hearsay ignores the data and other possible explanations. McConnell won Breathitt County in &nbsp;2020 with 1,308 more votes than he received in the county’s much closer 2014 race, which he . The 2019 governor’s race was also , but Democrat Andy Beshear eked out a 69-vote victory. Beshear won the race statewide.ADVERTISEMENT&nbsp;McConnell’s results were even more out of whack in two other nearby Appalachian counties. In his six previous Senate elections, Elliott and Wolfe counties had never voted for McConnell. Even up to last year, Elliott County remained reliably Democratic in non-presidential races, voting for the party’s entire Democratic slate in both the 2015 and 2019 statewide elections. Yet in 2020, McConnell won 64% of the votes in Wolfe County and 66% of the votes in Elliott County. McGrath only got 21% of registered Democrats in Wolfe and 20% in Elliott.ADVERTISEMENTNext, take the premise that there would be some basic logic in the voting patterns of those who did vote Democratic. One might expect a registered Democrat, who’s going to vote Democratic, would walk into the booth and cast their vote for both Joe Biden and Amy McGrath. But the data tell another story. In 119 of 120 counties, Amy McGrath got more votes than Joe Biden. In some counties, the votes were close. But in counties like Breathitt and Elliott, 1 out of 5 voters appear to have filled out their ballots with votes for both the female Democratic Amy McGrath and the Republican pussy-grabber Donald Trump.&nbsp;Then there is the question of why a county like Breathitt has more registered voters than it has people of voting age? shows that Breathitt County had 12,630 people with approximately 23% below the voting age of 18. This means approximately 9,700 people are of voting age, yet there are 11,497 . Having 100% of the voting-age population registered would be astounding enough, but Breathitt County appears to have almost 120% more registered voters than age-eligible citizens. And looking further, it appears this is not limited to Breathitt.ADVERTISEMENT&nbsp;In November 2017, Judicial Watch, a right-wing non-partisan foundation promoting transparency, sued Kentucky over its “Dirty Voter Rolls” and its failure to maintain accurate voter registration lists. The argued that 48 of the 120 Kentucky counties had more registered voters than citizens over the age of 18 and alleged that Kentucky was one of only three states with a statewide active registration rate greater than 100% of the age-eligible citizen population. Kentucky’s inflated voter rolls, and lack of transparency, provide a perfect cover for malfeasant behavior regarding the election results.Turning an 18% approval into a 58% win may seem like a “turning water into wine”-style miracle, but a “smoke &amp; mirrors” parlor trick seems more likely. To better understand how the data could have been manipulated, look no further than Trump’s own legal filings. In an incompetent post-election lawsuit, the Trump team may have intended to accuse Democrats of election fraud, but in describing a possible plot, they attributed the cheating to Trump himself.In a , Trump’s legal team referred to a “machine-controlled algorithm deliberately run” by a voting machine vendor, Dominion Voting Systems. They allege this algorithm “generally took more than 2.5% of the votes from Mr. Biden and flipped them to Mr. Trump.” So Trump’s own legal team, instead of providing evidence of fraud by Biden’s side, may have inadvertently revealed fraud benefiting Trump. In describing a deliberate, vendor installed, machine-controlled algorithm automatically taking a percentage of Biden’s votes and giving them to Trump, they certainly are outlining how fraud could have been executed.ADVERTISEMENTTrump’s team claims Dominion was the machine vendor embedding algorithms to “flip” votes but is Trump pointing to one machine vendor to distract from another?In Kentucky, when looking at counties where the numbers leap out on behalf of Mitch McConnell, none used Dominion machines. Most used machines from Election Systems &amp; Software (ES&amp;S), a Dominion competitor. If you swap ES&amp;S for Dominion in the alleged vote-flipping scheme, you may arrive at an alternate explanation for why Amy McGrath’s numbers weren’t lining up and correlating with Biden’s.ADVERTISEMENTLindsey Graham’s race in South Carolina was so tight that he infamously , yet he won with a comfortable 10% lead—tabulated on ES&amp;S machines throughout the state. In Susan Collins’s Maine, where she after July 2, almost . Kentucky, South Carolina, Maine, Texas, Iowa and Florida are all . Maybe the polls didn’t actually get it wrong.When Trump says “look over here” at Dominion voting machines, maybe we should look at ES&amp;S machines instead. When Republicans spout unfounded claims that Democrats stole the election, maybe we should be looking at Republican vote totals instead. And when Trump calls this the most fraudulent election in our history, maybe he knows of what he speaks.You can follow Alison Greene on Twitter… then let us make a small request. The COVID crisis has slashed advertising rates, and we need your help. Like you, we here at Raw Story believe in the power of progressive journalism. Raw Story readers power David Cay Johnston’s DCReport, which we've expanded to keep watch in Washington. We’ve exposed billionaire and uncovered White House efforts to . We’ve revealed , and legal efforts to harm workers exploited by . And unlike other news outlets, we’ve decided to make our original content free. But we need your support to do what we do.Raw Story is independent. Unhinged from corporate overlords, we fight to ensure no one is forgotten.We need your support in this difficult time. Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Invest with us. , or… then let us make a small request. The COVID crisis has slashed advertising rates, and we need your help. Like you, we believe in the power of progressive journalism — and we’re investing in investigative reporting as other publications give it the ax. Raw Story readers power David Cay Johnston’s DCReport, which we've expanded to keep watch in Washington. We’ve exposed billionaire and uncovered White House efforts to . We’ve revealed , and efforts to harm workers exploited by . We need your support to do what we do.Raw Story is independent. You won’t find mainstream media bias here. Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Invest with us in the future. , orReport typos and corrections to: .Donald Trump's conspiracy theories about the 2020 presidential election were on Friday. Trump lost Nevada to President-elect Joe Biden by 33,596 votes, but has continued to push delusions that the election results should be overturned.https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1339597489926590465https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1339275859841134594On Friday, Nevada Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske put out a "Facts vs. Myths" graphic to debunk Trump's lies.Republicans in Arizona are battling each other as supporters of Donald Trump in the legislature and state party tussle with local governments over the president's election fraud conspiracy theories.President-elect Joe Biden was the first Democrat to carry Arizona since Bill Clinton won the state with less than 47% of the vote in the 1996 three-way race with Bob Dole and H. Ross Perot.But President Donald Trump falsely claims he fought the state and has lashed out at Republican Gov. Doug Ducey, urging his supporters to vote him out of office.https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1337749020706549762&nbsp; Donald Trump's last night to stay in the White House as president is January 19th. The next day, as per the Constitution, Joe Biden will be sworn in and take over the famous address at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.But Trump has a problem: he's loathed in New York City and it is against the rules for him to live at Mar-a-Lago.Trump's predicament is the focus of a new piece by Washington Post columnist Helaine Olen."This week, The Post&nbsp;&nbsp;that a lawyer for the evangelical DeMoss family, President Trump’s next-door neighbor at Mar-a-Lago, had submitted a letter to the town of Palm Beach pointing out that an agreement Trump signed with the town decades ago forbids anyone — including the soon-to-be-former president — from using the property as a primary residence," Olen noted. "This presents a practical issue for Trump: In 2019, he&nbsp;&nbsp;his legal residence to the private club."&nbsp;&nbsp;Comments:As a special thank you from all of us at Raw, we're offering Raw Story ad-free for 15% off - just $2 per week. Now 'til Dec. 31st.LEARN MORE

RED BARBLUE BAROn a Thursday in August in Louisville, months before the 2020 election, a parade of cars filled with Kentucky Teamster representatives and labor groups, showed their constant blocking of critical COVID aid. They drove by McConnell’s office raucously honking and bearing signs saying “Mitch better have my money.”In 2017, a asked Kentuckians, “Do you approve or disapprove of Senator Mitch McConnell’s job performance?” Only 18% approved. He clawed his rating back up to 39% on the eve of the election.ADVERTISEMENTMcConnell, leader of Senate Republicans, rarely holds town hall...

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Alison Greene

The Raw Story (also stylized as RawStory) is an American online tabloid founded in 2004 by John K. Byrne. It covers current national and international political events and publishes its own editorials which tend to advocate for progressive positions. The Raw Story is a news site, bringing attention to stories that it sees as downplayed or ignored by other media outlets.

BUSTED? Why the numbers behind Mitch McConnell’s re-election don’t add up

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