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Dear John,
There’s a dirty Trump trick you need to look out for. He used it in 2020 to try to overturn the election, and he’s going to do it again. But it doesn’t work if you know it’s coming. Watch out for Trump to exploit something elections experts call the “red mirage” to prematurely declare victory before all the votes are counted.
You see, in almost every election, Republicans appear to take an early lead. That’s the red mirage. Then, that lead gets smaller throughout the night, which is called the “blue shift.” This happens because Republican votes tend to be counted before Democratic votes.
It’s not magic. Votes are counted by precinct, and Democrats tend to live in more densely populated, urban precincts, while Republicans tend to live in more sparsely populated, rural ones. It just takes longer to count the votes in a precinct with a lot of people than in a precinct with fewer people.
Leave it to Trump to use a completely predictable and normal phenomenon to cast doubt on the outcome of the election with no actual evidence of fraud. We can predict his false claims as easily as we can predict that there will be a “red mirage” and a “blue shift.” Watch our video and send it to friends so they won’t let their friends be taken in either.
In Georgia, for example, there are more than 300 times as many people living in Fulton County as in deep-red Glascock County. If Fulton County has 300 times as many ballots to count as Glascock, obviously Glascock is going to finish counting first.
In 2020, when numbers came in from counties like Glascock first, it made it look like Trump was leading in Georgia, when he really was not. It was a red mirage. Also, Democrats are more likely to vote by mail, and mail-in votes take longer to count.
Anyone who follows elections knows about the red mirage and blue shift, as the former political director of Fox News has testified. But in 2020, Trump pretended the blue shift was surprising and suspicious. But there was nothing miraculous or secret about it.
Still, it’s easy to see why people who don’t know about the red mirage could be tricked into thinking that something unusual had happened. Trump-ally Steve Bannon predicted in October 2020 -- before the election -- Trump would make this deceitful claim. And that’s just what Trump did on election night.
Trump’s nonsense claim that votes counted earlier in the night were more legitimate than those counted later became the underpinning of the entire Big Lie, culminating in the January 6th attack on the Capitol.
The 2024 election will likely be close, and early in the night, Trump may appear to be ahead and again use that early lead to falsely claim victory.
Mirages can be confusing, but if you know what they are, you won’t be fooled by them. Please help spread the word -- and this video -- about the red mirage, so people know what to expect.
Thank you for helping counter disinformation that Trump will surely spread on election night.
Robert Reich
Inequality Media Civic Action
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