Bots Spread False Claims of Voter Fraud in Kentucky [View all]
Bots Spread False Claims of Voter Fraud in Kentucky
November 11, 2019 at 12:11 pm EST By Taegan Goddard112 Comments
https://politicalwire.com/2019/11/11/bots-spread-false-claims-of-voter-fraud-in-kentucky/
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A few hours after polls closed in Kentucky last Tuesday, a Twitter user writing under the handle @Overlordkraken1 posted a message to his 19 followers saying he had just shredded a box of Republican mail-in ballots,' the New York Times reports.
For those eager to cry fraud as a reliably red state leaned blue, the fact that @Overlordkraken1 did not appear to be in Kentucky Louisville was misspelled in the location tag on his tweet, for one thing was not going to get in the way of a useful narrative. Nor was Twitters decision to suspend his account.
Within hours of @Overlordkraken1s tweet, as it became apparent that Mr. Bevin was trailing in the vote tally, hyperpartisan conservatives and trolls were pushing out a screenshot of the message, boosted by what appeared to be a network of bots, and providing early grist for allegations of electoral theft in Kentucky. High-profile right-wing figures were soon tweeting out their own conspiracy theories about the election being stolen messages that were in turn pushed by even more trolls and bots and the Bevin campaign began talking about irregularities in the vote without offering any specifics or evidence.
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