- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
Summary
Trump’s popular vote share has fallen below 50% to 49.94%, with Kamala Harris at 48.26%, narrowing his margin of victory.
Trump’s share of the popular vote is lower than Biden’s in 2020 (51.3%), Obama’s in 2012 (51.1%) and 2008 (52.9%), George W. Bush’s in 2004 (50.7%), George H.W. Bush’s in 1988 (53.2%), Reagan’s in 1984 (58.8%) and 1980 (50.7%), and Carter’s in 1976 (50.1%).
The 2024 election results highlight Trump’s narrow victory and the need for Democrats to address their mistakes and build a diverse working-class coalition.
The numbers also give Democrats a reason to push back on Trump’s mandate claims, noting most Americans did not vote for him.
What about the starling machines
I couldn’t find anything about voting machines named Starling. There is a StarLink theory. The problem is that seems to be based on a TikTok video that was incoherent by most reports, and is no longer up.
I get that moneyed interests could get evidence removed from a centralized social media service. But nothing in the transcript I’ve found describes a specific link from StarLink to voting machines. In fact it sounds like the person just described the basics of TCP/IP in a roundabout way to make it sound sinister. The problem is election systems are air gapped with the exception of a few highly controlled access points. Situations where that’s been compromised, (such as allowing remote work from home for election office workers) have made the news for precisely the reason that it’s rare. And the most credible criticism of election security is that the election office’s computers could be compromised and used to spread malware to machines. But that’s an inherent weakness. If the office can’t access the results, they can’t report them.
Furthermore, there’s nothing special about StarLink that would make them a better access route. They aren’t close enough to intercept the unofficial results as a false cellphone tower, (and that wouldn’t change the official results later anyways), and any traffic going through them to attack election systems would also have to travel through modems on the ground, controlled by election officials. So destroying the satellite does nothing for covering your tracks. If you believe they can erase all traces of their traffic, then there’s no need to destroy a satellite as surely that would be even easier on a satellite controlled by a close ally.
At the end of the day, with what we know right now, the fuck up was with the Democrat’s messaging. Not anything to do with election security.