Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election
<jats:p>The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election saw an unprecedented number of false claims alleging election fraud and arguing that Donald Trump was the actual winner of the election. Here we report a sur-vey exploring belief in these false claims that was conducted three days after Biden was dec...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Shorenstein Center for Media, Politics, and Public Policy
2022
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/144267 |
| _version_ | 1826197972283555840 |
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| author | Pennycook, Gordon Rand, David G |
| author2 | Sloan School of Management |
| author_facet | Sloan School of Management Pennycook, Gordon Rand, David G |
| author_sort | Pennycook, Gordon |
| collection | MIT |
| description | <jats:p>The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election saw an unprecedented number of false claims alleging election fraud and arguing that Donald Trump was the actual winner of the election. Here we report a sur-vey exploring belief in these false claims that was conducted three days after Biden was declared the winner. We find that a majority of Trump voters in our sample – particularly those who were more politically knowledgeable and more closely following election news – falsely believed that election fraud was widespread and that Trump won the election. Thus, false beliefs about the elec-tion are not merely a fringe phenomenon. We also find that Trump conceding or losing his legal challenges would likely lead a majority of Trump voters to accept Biden’s victory as legitimate, alt-hough 40% said they would continue to view Biden as illegitimate regardless. Finally, we found that levels of partisan spite and endorsement of violence were equivalent between Trump and Biden voters.</jats:p> |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T10:56:39Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/144267 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T10:56:39Z |
| publishDate | 2022 |
| publisher | Shorenstein Center for Media, Politics, and Public Policy |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1442672023-02-06T19:33:49Z Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election Pennycook, Gordon Rand, David G Sloan School of Management <jats:p>The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election saw an unprecedented number of false claims alleging election fraud and arguing that Donald Trump was the actual winner of the election. Here we report a sur-vey exploring belief in these false claims that was conducted three days after Biden was declared the winner. We find that a majority of Trump voters in our sample – particularly those who were more politically knowledgeable and more closely following election news – falsely believed that election fraud was widespread and that Trump won the election. Thus, false beliefs about the elec-tion are not merely a fringe phenomenon. We also find that Trump conceding or losing his legal challenges would likely lead a majority of Trump voters to accept Biden’s victory as legitimate, alt-hough 40% said they would continue to view Biden as illegitimate regardless. Finally, we found that levels of partisan spite and endorsement of violence were equivalent between Trump and Biden voters.</jats:p> 2022-08-08T16:12:52Z 2022-08-08T16:12:52Z 2021 2022-08-08T16:01:49Z Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/144267 Pennycook, Gordon and Rand, David G. 2021. "Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election." Harvard Kennedy School Misinformation Review. en 10.37016/MR-2020-51 Harvard Kennedy School Misinformation Review Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ application/pdf Shorenstein Center for Media, Politics, and Public Policy Harvard Kennedy School Misinformation Review |
| spellingShingle | Pennycook, Gordon Rand, David G Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election |
| title | Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election |
| title_full | Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election |
| title_fullStr | Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election |
| title_full_unstemmed | Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election |
| title_short | Research note: Examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 Presidential Election |
| title_sort | research note examining false beliefs about voter fraud in the wake of the 2020 presidential election |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/144267 |
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