Wisconsin voters line up outside of a Milwaukee polling place on Nov. 5, 2024. Wisconsin U.S. Senate candidate Eric Hovde is one of the Republican politicians who sowed doubt about the integrity of this year’s election. (Andy Manis | Getty Images)

President-elect Donald Trump may have quieted his lies about widespread voter fraud after his win earlier this month, but the impact of his effort to cast doubt on the integrity of American elections lingers on.

Although this post-election period has been markedly calmer than the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election, there were isolated flare-ups of Republican candidates borrowing a page from Trump’s playbook to claim that unsatisfactory election results were illegitimate.

In Wisconsin, Republican U.S. Senate challenger Eric Hovde spread unsubstantiated rumors about “last-minute” absentee ballots in Milwaukee that he said flipped the outcome of the race. Though he conceded to incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin nearly two weeks after the election, his rhetoric helped stoke a spike in online conspiracy theories. The Milwaukee Election Commission disputed his claims, saying they “lack any merit.”

In North Carolina, Republican state Senate leader Phil Berger told reporters last week he feared that the vote-counting process for a state Supreme Court seat was rigged for Democrats. Karen Brinson Bell, the head of the State Board of Elections, skewered Berger for his comments, saying they could inspire violence.

And in Arizona, Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kari Lake, who has spent two years disputing her defeat in the 2022 governor’s race, hasn’t acknowledged her Senate loss. While she thanked her supporters in a video posted to X, the platform formerly called Twitter, she stopped short of conceding to Democratic U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego.

Republicans’ disinformation campaigns have caused Americans’ confidence in elections to plummet and exposed local election officials to threats and harassment, and some observers worry about a return of the GOP’s destructive rhetoric the next time they lose.

“We have to turn this rhetoric down,” said Jay Young, senior director of voting and democracy for Common Cause, a voting rights group. “There cannot be this continued attack on this institution.”

Still, many politicians who either denied the 2020 election results or criticized their local voting processes won election. In Arizona, for example, voters chose state Rep. Justin Heap, a Republican, to lead the election office in Maricopa County, home to Phoenix and the largest jurisdiction in the critical swing state. Heap ran on a “voter confidence” platform and suggested at a Trump rally that Maricopa’s election office is a “national laughingstock.”

Trump tapped former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi to oversee the U.S. Department of Justice. Bondi, a Republican, served as an attorney for Trump while he disputed the results in 2020. She could use her position as U.S. attorney general to prosecute election officials involved in that election, as Trump promised in an X post in September.

While the rhetoric around stolen elections has been somewhat muted among the GOP ranks since Trump’s victory, conservatives attempted to flip the “election denial” script on Democrats in at least one race.

In Pennsylvania, Democratic U.S. Sen. Bob Casey refused to concede defeat until last Thursday, two weeks after The Associated Press called the race for Republican challenger David McCormick. Casey lost by fewer than 16,000 votes, less than half a percentage point.

Casey said he wanted to see the results of an automatic recount and various court cases filed on his behalf, but Republicans jumped on his refusal to bow out quickly.

Last week, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican who resisted pressure from Trump in 2020 to “find” votes after he lost the state, lambasted Casey for not conceding the Senate race.

“Election denialism needs to end, now,” Raffensperger wrote in a statement. “We are a country of laws and principles, not of men and personalities. Do your job! Follow the law. Accept election results or lose your country.”

Even as Republicans mostly toned down their rhetoric this year, some left-wing social media accounts repeated a debunked conspiracy theory that Starlink, the internet provider owned by billionaire and Trump supporter Elon Musk, changed vote counts.

Those posts, however, aren’t comparable to GOP election denialism, according to the University of Washington’s Center for an Informed Public, which fights strategic misinformation.

“While the claims are similar, the rumoring dynamics on the left are markedly different due to the lack of endorsement or amplification by left-leaning influencers, candidates, or party elites,” the center posted last week.

Young, of Common Cause, said it’s clear that election disinformation of any kind has a devastating impact on the local officials tasked with administering the vote.

Threats to election workers continued even after Election Day. Bomb threats were called into election offices in California, Minnesota, Oregon and other states, forcing evacuations as workers were tallying ballots.

But this was just a slice of the onslaught many officials faced over the past four years. Local election officials need the resources to beef up the way they fight disinformation and physical attacks, Young said.

“We should be doing better by them,” he said.

Stateline is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott S. Greenberger for questions: info@stateline.org. Follow Stateline on Facebook and X.

Former President Barack Obama speaks during a campaign rally in support of Democratic presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris at Temple University October 28 in Philadelphia. (Win McNamee | Getty Images)

PHILADELPHIA — Kicking off the final full week of campaigning before the 2024 presidential election, former President Barack Obama hit the trail for Vice President Kamala Harris for a rally that doubled as a concert with performances from Bruce Springsteen and John Legend.

As he’s done at other stops on the campaign trail this cycle, Obama wasted no time criticizing former President Donald Trump, the GOP nominee for president, accusing him of whining about his problems and only thinking about himself rather than the American people.

“Most of all, Donald Trump wants us to think this country is hopelessly divided between us and them,” Obama said. “Between the quote real Americans who support him, of course, and the outsiders who don’t. The enemies within.”

He blasted Trump for his Sunday night rally at Madison Square Garden, where a comedian referred to Puerto Rico as an “island of garbage,” and other speakers mocked Harris’ race.

“These are your fellow citizens he’s talking about here,” Obama said. “Here’s a good rule: If somebody does not respect you, if somebody does not see you as a fellow citizen with equal claims to opportunity, to the pursuit of happiness, to the American dream, you should not vote for them.”

“You should not expect them to make your life better. They will not help you pay the bills. They’re not gonna work hard to make sure your kid gets a good education. They’re not gonna help you with a down payment on a house. We have to reject the kind of politics of division and hatred that we saw represented,” he added.

The Trump campaign issued a statement following the Sunday rally saying the “joke” about Puerto Rico “does not reflect the views of President Trump or the campaign.”

Philadelphia, where Harris unveiled a new proposal with Puerto Rico on Sunday, is home to the second-largest stateside Puerto Rican population among U.S. cities, only trailing New York City, according to the 2020 Census. Just under 500,000 Puerto Ricans live in Pennsylvania, making it the state with the third largest concentration in the nation, according to a 2019 report from the Center for Puerto Rican Studies.

Monday evening’s event in North Philadelphia is a part of the Harris’ campaign’s “When We Vote We Win” concert series that is aiming to drive up voter turnout in key battleground states, including Pennsylvania.

Obama touted his administration’s record, including the Affordable Care Act, and brought up several times Trump’s “concepts of a plan” for replacing the ACA. Trump made the comment during last month’s debate with Harris in Philadelphia, during a discussion on healthcare. Obama also highlighted the economy he inherited when he took office in 2009 to the one he gave to Trump when he entered the Oval Office.

“Some people are saying ‘well, I remember the economy when he first came in, that was pretty good,” Obama said. “Yea, it was good because it was my economy.”

Legend and Springsteen also offered a few words during their performances on stage, echoing the message from some of the songs.

“Kamala Harris has a vision for all of us, a vision that includes everybody and fights for the freedoms we deserve and the future we can build together,” Legend said. “Like Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, Teddy Pendergrass and the great Philadelphia artists said it’s time to wake up and Philadelphia, it’s time to choose where we stand.”

Legend performed Wake Up Everybody by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes, and opened with Sam Cooke’s A Change is Gonna Come.

“I believe in a brighter tomorrow,” Legend said. “I believe that a change is going to come, Philadelphia.”

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.), who introduced Springsteen to the stage, accused his Republican challenger Dave McCormick of being on the side of billionaires, while he is focused on delivering for middle class families.

Obama offered praise for Casey, who was an early supporter of his 2008 bid for the White House.

“I love his entire family and I can tell you there is nobody who is more humble, more honest, more rooted in his community, more dedicated to this great state than Bob Casey,” Obama said.

The Trump campaign sent out a statement on Monday prior to the rally.

“Democrats’ continued reliance on celebrities and Barack Obama, a president from over 10 years ago, to make the case for their party’s presidential candidate is another indication that Kamala’s pitch for another four years of unlimited illegal immigration, inflation, and wars abroad is falling flat with Pennsylvanians,” said Trump campaign spokesperson Kush Desai. “Glitzy celebrities and presidents of yesteryear aren’t going to make up for a mediocre message, disastrous record, and less-than-appealing candidate.”

The Liacouras Center has been the host of several high profile campaign events in Philadelphia this year. In June, Trump held a rally at the arena, while Harris and Walz held their first joint event together as a ticket in August.

Democrats need to put up big numbers in Philadelphia and its collar counties to carry the commonwealth. Harris spent Sunday campaigning through the city of Brotherly Love in an effort to shore up support among Black and Latino voters.

Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle Parker and Pennsylvania House Speaker Joanna McClinton, who both spoke at Harris’ rally on Sunday in Philadelphia, also delivered remarks on Monday evening.

McClinton said as she left her house before the rally, her mother said she looked nice and asked where she was going.

“I said, I’m going to see the best president that ever did it,” McClinton said, to applause. “Tonight, in our midst, we are going to give a warm Philly welcome to our 44th president, President Barack Hussein Obama.”

Parker spoke for just over 10 minutes and engaged with the crowd throughout her speech. At one point, she directed half of the audience to say “Kamala Harris,” while the other half responded “for the people.”

While Springsteen and Legend headlined the event, music played throughout the evening between speakers. At one point, the DJ led the crowd for a popular Ludacris song from 2001, putting a twist on it by saying “Move Trump get out the way.”

Trump was most recently in the state on Saturday for a rally at Penn State. He’s returning on Tuesday for a roundtable discussion in Delaware County and a rally in Allentown.

The running mates have also hit the campaign trail in the past few days. Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the Democratic Party’s nominee for vice president, campaigned through the eastern half of the state on Friday, while U.S. Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), the GOP candidate for vice president, was in Harrisburg and Erie. Walz and Vance are also scheduled to be in the state later this week.

The final Saturday is also shaping up to be a busy day for both campaigns. Trump is reportedly making plans to attend the Penn State vs Ohio State football game in State College, while former First Lady Michelle Obama will campaign in Pennsylvania for the Harris-Walz ticket. Visits continue to take place as the race is coming down to the wire. Polling shows both candidates in a dead heat for the state’s 19 electoral votes.

State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (D-Philadelphia), candidate for auditor general and Temple University alum, told the crowd on Monday that “none of us want to live in Donald Trump’s dark, twisted future from the 1700s.”

Kenyatta was very briefly interrupted during his speech with the sound of a ringing phone coming over the speakers, which could be heard through the entire arena.

“That is the future calling,” Kenyatta said, smiling. “And I hope you’re ready to answer.”

Pennsylvania Capital-Star is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Pennsylvania Capital-Star maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Kim Lyons for questions: info@penncapital-star.com. Follow Pennsylvania Capital-Star on Facebook and X.