Corbin is professor emeritus of marketing at the University of Northern Iowa.
Numerous audits and in-depth investigations led by Republicans have confirmed there is no evidence of voter fraud and machine rigging in the 2020 presidential election. Even former President Donald Trump has finally admitted he lost the election.
It is vitally important for voters to trust the 2024 election process. Post-election analysis, truth-telling by Trump and GOP-led investigations into the 2020 race should erase voters’ concern about the integrity of the upcoming election.
First, recall how Cassidy Hutchinson (assistant to Mark Meadows, Trump’s chief of staff) testified before the Jan. 6 select committee that Trump told Meadows and other White House staff that he lost the 2020 election. Hutchinson’s testimony has never been proven to be false.
Second, on Aug. 4, Trump — in an interview with podcaster Lex Fridman — admitted that he lost the 2020 presidential election. Trump also said he “lost the 2020 election” on two other occasions: Aug. 23, at an event near the southern border, and on Aug. 30, at the Moms for Liberty summit.
Third, the 2020 election deniers may purposely be ignoring that eight prominent, life-long Republicans, all attorneys, published a 72-page, research-based document in July 2021 in which they concluded that Joe Biden won the election fair and square. All voters should read, at a bare minimum, the introduction and executive summary of “ Lost, Not Stolen.”
Fourth, Ken Block, a data analytics expert and Trump campaign consultant, was hired by the Trump campaign to find voter fraud in the 2020 election. In a deposition taken by the Jan. 6 committee, he revealed the same results as noted in “Lost, Not Stolen” — that there were no voter irregularities anywhere in America.
Fifth, when white nationalist Nick Fuentes — Trump’s guest at a Nov. 22, 2022, Mar-a-Lago dinner — learned that Trump admitted he lost in 2020, he blasted Trump on his Sept. 6 podcast, requesting voters to not back Trump this year. An infuriated Fuentes stated, “So, why did we do Stop the Steal?” Trump’s Stop the Steal conspiracy theory has been touted 526 times on his Truth Social social media platform and will be a permanent stain on America’s revered voting process.
Lost, not Stolen
The eight Republican attorneys conducted a deep legal review of all 64 court cases filed by Trump and his supporters to contest the 2020 results. The final report, with 280 reference citations, provided unequivocal evidence that Trump lost. They found there was “ no credible evidence that fraud changed the outcome even in a single precinct, let alone in any state.”
The attorneys “also examined, point by point, every fraud accusation made in social media and in the public forum by those who claimed the election was stolen.” They found no improper vote counts, no voting machine rigging, no absentee ballot fraud, no voter identification fraud and no blocking of observers during the vote count.
The report’s authors include three prominent retired federal judges ( Thomas Griffith, Michael McConnell and J. Michael Luttig), former Solicitor General Theodore Olson, election lawyer Benjamin Ginsberg, longtime congressional senior aide David Hoppe and former Sens. John Danforth (Mo.) and Gordon Smith (Ore.).
They urged “fellow conservatives to cease obsessing over the results of the 2020 election.”
It’s interesting that 81 percent of adults surveyed in an ABC News/Ispos poll will accept the results of our upcoming Nov. 5 election. This means 19 percent of Americans — the ill-informed and gullible — have accepted Trump and GOP officials’ Stop the Steal pretense. Furthermore, 67 percent of Americans feel Trump isn’t prepared to accept the outcome unless he wins.
Patriotic Americans should feel sad for the 2020 election deniers, who have been hoodwinked, led down a dark rabbit hole, and given disinformation, misinformation and blatant propaganda. The 2020 Stop the Steal conspiracy theory movement has been proven — beyond a shadow of doubt — to be fallacious.
You should feel very comfortable voting on Nov. 5. Why? Close and contested elections are a part of American history, and all states have processes in place to handle just such situations. It is critical that citizens understand how these systems work so that they trust the results. Trusted elections are the foundation of our democracy.
On Nov. 5, don’t fret. Vote!
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks with U.S. President Donald Trump during a Cabinet meeting in the Cabinet Room of the White House on May 27, 2026 in Washington, D.C. Trump met with his Cabinet days after saying a peace deal with Iran was“ largely negotiated” amid expectations around the re-opening the Strait of Hormuz.
The worst deal in the history of deals
As a former Republican, sometimes it’s fun to look back on the things we — I was part of a “we” at one time — criticized Democrats for, and not all that long ago.
Remember, if you will, when Republicans condemned former President Bill Clinton for pardoning his brother and his corrupt donor friend Marc Rich?
Or, remember when Republicans wagged their fingers at former President Barack Obama’s golf outings? Or his executive orders? Or his Syrian “red line”?
Or all the times Republicans went after former President Joe Biden’s gaffes?
While those criticisms may have been justified at the time, they look patently ridiculous next to our current president’s cartoonish and downright dangerous offenses.
Offenses like pardoning Jan. 6 insurrectionists — nearly 100 of whom have gone on to be arrested for, charged with, or convicted of crimes separate from the events of that day.
Or wreaking havoc on the global economy by instituting reckless tariffs on friends, neighbors, and enemies alike?
Or taking a proverbial sledge hammer to countless government agencies that have put every American in danger, whether on airplanes, in hospitals, at job sites, or in natural disasters.
That’s just a few, but nothing looks worse next to his predecessors than Donald Trump’s supposed Iran deal, at least as it’s outlined in the Memorandum of Understanding, the details of which Trump was loath to share.
And for good reason — they are shockingly bad and humiliating for the U.S.
I remember Obama’s Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA from 2015 very well. I, along with many Republicans as well as a cadre of foreign policy experts, criticized that deal for its obvious and problematic concessions to a very bad actor who we’ve long known could not be trusted. But trust was what we gave the Iranian regime, as well as sudden access to a boatload of cash — $100 billion, to be exact.
All of Obama’s provisions were temporary, which would allow Iran to restart enriching uranium upon their sunset; the deal didn’t address Iran’s ballistic missiles, or its funding of terrorist proxies like Hezbollah and Hamas; the supposed “anytime, anywhere” inspections came with a 24-day delay, if Iran so chose, giving them ample time to hide any suspect materials; and it didn’t require any congressional authority.
In short, I’d argue it wasn’t a great deal. But as bad as it was, it looks like the Magna Carta next to Trump’s.
Trump’s deal would give Iran immediate sanction relief and access to $300 billion, presumably to use to fund terror proxies; it doesn’t secure any upfront limits on uranium enrichment or missile development; it allows Iran to charge for safe passage through the Strait of Hormuz in the future; and it calls for Israel to stop its attacks on Hezbollah, another win for Iran.
Neither Americans nor the Middle East are safer than we were 100-plus days ago when Trump decided to pursue this folly. And in fact, our economy is weaker for it. But Iran is unquestionably stronger and more emboldened.
They’ve seen Trump’s weakness, unseriousness, and frighteningly limited appreciation for history. They’ve seen him retreat on most of his core threats to the regime, from bombing their cultural sites to ending a civilization overnight. And they’ve taken notice as he’s abandoned the promises that were supposedly central to his justification for war in the first place — regime change, liberating the Iranian people, and removing Iran’s nuclear materials.
What a waste of blood and treasure, not to mention American might and power, only so that our enemies can watch us limp desperately toward a conclusion that’s being described — by the right — as “unthinkable,” “appeasement,” and “the worst foreign policy blunder in decades.”
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.