If you thought you were done luxuriating in fancy baths of right-wing tears following Issue 1’s landslide loss in Ohio on Tuesday night, it’s time to buckle up for a soothing bath bomb or two. Since a not-insignificant number of minority-rule-loving Republicans have decided to histrionically question the results of any election that doesn’t go their way, they’re now laser-focused on minor, isolated voting glitches that ultimately have zero effect on the results of landslide elections—if they’re even real.
Issue 1 was an antidemocratic measure intended to raise the threshold for amending the state constitution through ballot referenda. It was also widely seen as a referendum on abortion rights, and on Tuesday it flamed out in lurid fashion at the ballot box, losing by a gaudy 14%. But that didn’t stop some of the usual suspects from questioning the results, even as the Ohio GOP sprayed blame like male models at a gas station.
During Tuesday’s voting, machines at one polling location in Summit County—home to Akron—reportedly had some issues that impacted voters. But for MAGA world, suddenly it was election night 2020 all over again. Seizing on one anodyne report of minor delays in voting in one precinct in one city, several MAGAs cried foul about the entire election—because that’s basically all they do now.
RELATED STORY: GOP plan to make ballot measures harder to pass in Ohio goes down in flames
It all started with this rather tame report on problems with several voting machines at a single polling location in the city of Cuyahoga Falls, via Mike Holden of Cleveland ABC affiliate WEWS:
For those unable or unwilling to watch that video, Holden’s report boils down to a few key points:
- There was a ballot jam on more than one of the machines; the screens directed voters to ask a poll worker for help.
- As a result, some voters were unable to immediately scan their ballots.
- Voters had the option of placing their ballots in an orange box to be scanned later, or they could void their ballots and come back.
- Some people were concerned and upset.
Alert the media! Oh, wait. That guy is the media. And his report is kind of unremarkable and boring, frankly.
But in MAGA world, it clearly means Hugo Chavez’s reanimated corpse is orbiting the Earth in an Italian satellite, zapping voting machines with bamboo lasers, and sucking “YES” votes like digital energy vampires into the blessed ether!
Luckily for Cuyahoga Falls voters, Arizona Not-Gov. Kari Lake, whom God created out of one of Mike Lindell’s discarded McRibs, was there to expose create malfeasance from afar. No one else could have done it! Just like no one else can hear her absinthe fairies when they tell her to fly back to Mar-a-Lago.
For the nontweeters:
KARI LAKE: Sound familiar?? Looks like they took a page out of the Maricopa County “selections” playbook. Today is Election Day in Ohio and the machines don’t work. The swampy never-Trumper Ohio Secretary of State was too busy running for another office to do his job making sure Election Day runs smoothly. Reminds me of the jackasses who run Maricopa County elections when they sabotaged Election Day to stop the will of We the People. Wake up America.
Lake—who has 1.4M followers hanging on her every word—continues to claim the election she lost in November was fraudulent. Why? Beyond her refusal to admit she lost, there were printer issues in Maricopa County that, in some instances, led to a delay in the vote count—though, to be clear, every ballot was ultimately counted. Thus, Lake’s bids (plural) to reverse the results have so far been vigorously slapped down.
RELATED STORY: Big Liar Kari Lake's latest lawsuit loss costs her attorneys big money, but she's not done
But the movement Lake and her Big Daddy Mafia Don launched is still going strong, if the following reactions to the Cuyahoga Falls report are any indication. Other MAGAs were utterly and easily convinced that this was all a setup—because, again, the only legitimate election results are those the ocher arschloch 100% approves of.
Sir Rickster alerted his 30.6K followers!
ORANGE! It must be fraud!
But wait! Holden’s report was “clarified” by the Summit County Board of Elections. It wasn’t the machines, it was the people!
The Akron Beacon Journal:
Some Summit County poll workers were experiencing difficulties Tuesday handling new equipment, a Summit County Board of Elections official said.
But, he said, voting has not been affected.
Deputy Director Pete Zeigler said no machines malfunctioned, clarifying earlier reports, and said poll workers' unfamiliarity with new machines was to blame for incidents of ballots not properly feeding into scanners.
"These machines have not malfunctioned; this has only been happening because of poll workers struggling to learn the new equipment." Zeigler said, adding that a couple of machines were involved. "At no point was voting halted. They only swapped out machines as a precaution.”
A Columbus reporter also tried to stop the panic.
Holden himself didn’t bother to update his own 9,483 followers that “the scanners were fixed by 1 p.m and all votes were counted” until nearly 5 a.m. Wednesday.
That was more than 12 hours after Hank, who is blue-check-certified on Xwitter, asked his 10,000-plus followers, “Could these machine failures be more than just a coincidence during such a critical election?”
OAN felt compelled to weigh in, of course—after the election was called.
Transcript!
“It’s Maricopa County all over again. I’m Tom McGrath and this is your One American News daily feed for Tuesday, Aug. 8. Ballot scanners in Ohio malfunction in the midst of a crucial special election. Voters in Cuyahoga Falls were faced with an impediment to their civic duty as multiple voting machines reported ballot-jam issues. Residents were given the option to place their ballots in a box to be scanned later or void the ballot and report to the same location later.”
Oh, noes! The election is tainted! Throw it out! Some people’s votes were delayed! Delayed, I tells ya! That’s never once happened in the entire history of Ohio!
Meanwhile, as Kevin Kosar’s amazing thread on the Cuyahoga Falls contagion explains, many MAGA mofos were still crying foul this morning, even as the blubbery detritus from Issue 1’s exploding whale carcass continued to rain like liberal manna from the heavens. One of these characters was a notorious “Lindell TV” reporter too extreme even for Newsmax.
Yup, must be fraud, Emmy—even though Ohio’s elections are run by a Republican secretary of state. In fact, Frank LaRose is currently running for a U.S. Senate seat in the state. He really needed Issue 1 to succeed. Hmm, maybe he’s a RINO?
Oh, wait.
Phew! It’s not Frank’s fault Issue 1 failed, it was an” all-out assault” by “the radical left”—one that MAGA world thinks LaRose is secretly abetting!
This is funny, though!
Here’s the thing: Whether it’s a Xwitter war or a disproven election fraud conspiracy theory, MAGA will never, ever yield an inch. Not to the radical left, not to their own election officials, not to common sense, and certainly not to Joe Biden.
Then again, we have to wonder just how long they can keep singing from the same hymnal before their tunes go permanently stale.
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