LDF Prebunks Disproven Claims of Stolen 2020 Election Ahead of Trump’s Speech on Elections and Voting

Read a PDF of our statement here.

Tonight, President Donald Trump is scheduled to deliver remarks on U.S. elections and voting machines that will likely include his repeatedly disproven conspiracy theory of substantial fraud within the 2020 presidential election.

Ahead of the president's address, LDF President and Director-Counsel Janai Nelson issued the following statement:

"Trump has repeatedly and irresponsibly perpetuated the conspiracy that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, yet every single iteration of this Big Lie has been disproven by thoughtful fact finding and rational analysis.

"Instead of focusing on these delusions, the president should pay attention to the many real crises facing our country that disproportionately impact Black people and other communities of color, including the abuses of his destructive immigration enforcement apparatus, the escalating conflicts abroad, the affordability crisis that he continuously exacerbates, and the attack on voting rights and democracy that he and his administration are leading.

"Trump's false claims of voter fraud put our multiracial democracy at risk and undermine our ability to hold free and fair elections and ensure the peaceful transfer of power, as was brought into stark relief on Jan. 6, 2021. Furthermore, Trump continues to promote the passage of the SAVE Act, a voter suppression bill that would inflict real and disproportionate harm on Black voters and women, based on these false claims. While voter fraud is a myth, voter suppression targeting Black voters and other voters of color is very real. The media has an affirmative duty to rigorously fact check any and all specious claims that Trump may peddle in his address in an effort to misinform the American public."

LDF's recently issued report on voter suppression in 2024 confirmed that the election was marked by voter intimidation, exorbitant wait times, and erroneously scrubbed voter rolls. These findings and more are further detailed in LDF's Democracy Defended 2024 Report, which found that 2.1 million Texas voters were mistakenly scrubbed from voter rolls and placed on the suspended or inactive lists; 28,000 incorrect ballots were supplied to poll sites in St. Clair County, Alabama, on Election Day; absentee ballots were not delivered in time for 3,240 people in Cobb County, Georgia, to cast them ahead of the election; and three hour-plus wait times in Hinds County, Mississippi, the largest county in the state and the county with the most Black voters; and five Georgia poll sites in Fulton County were evacuated due to bomb threats on Election Day. LDF has pursued multiple lawsuits to redress the harms that many voters suffered as a result of these incidents during the 2024 election.

In order for this nation to fulfill the demands of a multiracial democracy, national and state leaders must address the remaining serious barriers to Black political participation.

Visit here to learn more about Democracy Defended 2024 and LDF's on-the-ground monitoring and advocacy throughout the 2024 primary and general elections.

Visit here to learn more about how to vote in the 2026 elections.

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Founded in 1940, the Legal Defense Fund (LDF)is the nation's first civil rights legal organization. LDF has been completely separate from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since 1957, though it was founded under the leadership of Thurgood Marshall while he was at the NAACP. LDF's Thurgood Marshall Institute (TMI) is a division of LDF that undertakes innovative research and houses LDF's archive. In all media attributions, please refer to us as the Legal Defense Fund or LDF (do not include NAACP) and refer to the Institute as LDF's Thurgood Marshall Institute or TMI.