The latest reminder that voting fraud is a mirage comes from Montana, which has a small population but is a big part of the Republican playbook for holding the Senate and propelling President Trump's re-election.
The GOP took alarmed notice recently when an audit of registration lists found almost 500 dead people still on the voter rolls. But, on closer inspection, investigators for the Republican-majority Legislature found no sign that any of them have voted from the grave — a practice the president falsely asserts is rampant and could undermine his shot at a second term.
The myth of party operatives using names and birthdates on headstones to prop up their Election Day vote totals is part of American lore, and may have been easier in decades before registration lists got digitized and federal law required they be kept up to date. But in recent years, while a tiny fraction of the deceased get overlooked during such cleanup efforts, evidence their identities have been claimed by live voters has been non-existent.
After it became clear the Russian government interfered with the 2016 presidential election, Congress approved a set of grants to states to bolster their safeguards against hacking. Montana spent $2 million to update its voter registration system, and the recent audit was commissioned to see if the changes worked.
Comparing the rolls against state death records, investigators found 493 people in both databases — one out of every 1,400 registered voters. But after looking at 4.6 million ballots cast in various elections since 2010, the auditors found just two instances where it appeared a ballot had been accepted after a voter's death. In one case, the namesake son had turned in his late father's absentee ballot instead of his own. The other was a clerical error at a county courthouse.
The result will be of no help to Trump. In recent days, he's gone beyond his by now familiar allegations that the election will be sullied by cheaters exploiting the unusually wide use of mail-in ballots because of the coronavirus pandemic. On "Fox & Friends" on Tuesday morning, and at several recent campaign stops, he declared that the only way he can lose is if the Democrats steal the election — another unprecedented assault on democratic norms from a White House occupant.
"The one thing we can't beat, if they cheat on the ballots," Trump told a rally Sunday in Nevada, where all registered voters will, receive ballots in the mail in few weeks. Of Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak, he said: "Now he will cheat on the ballots, I have no doubt about it."
Back in Montana, Trump remains a reasonable if not locked-in bet to carry the state's 3 electoral votes, which have gone to the GOP in six straight elections, while Democratic Gov. Steve Bullock is mounting a too-close-to-call bid for the Senate against Republican incumbent Steve Daines.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a“ Steel Across America” event ahead of the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11th attacks on the Ellipse near the White House on Sept. 8, 2026 in Washington, D.C. President Trump welcomed 9/ 11 first responders to the Tunnel to Towers Foundation’ s“ Steel Across America” event featuring a 16,900- pound, 21- foot steel beam recovered.
For Trump, even 9/11 is an opportunity
There was a reason organizers of the 9/11 ceremony in Manhattan told President Trump he could not speak at this year’s memorial service.
A good one, it turns out.
Because in a speech he gave on Tuesday in Washington, he did exactly what they were presumably worried about — he made it about himself.
According to The New York Times, Trump had wanted a speaking role at the service, but the National Sept. 11 Memorial and Museum, which oversees the site, said no, as they’ve maintained for the past decade-plus that the venue and event should be nonpartisan.
Trump has long used awful tragedies to either puff himself up, trash political opponents, or sell lies to the American people.
He blamed a deadly plane crash at Washington National Airport last year on diversity, equity and inclusion policies. He blamed Puerto Ricans for the devastation they endured after Hurricane Maria in 2017. He reportedly considered withholding disaster relief after the California wildfires based on the way affected regions voted. In an interview on Fox News meant to commemorate the 75th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy, he used the occasion to slam former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi…with graves of the dead behind him.
And now, as we approach the 25th anniversary of what many New Yorkers consider the darkest day in modern history, Trump has done it again.
He told a rambling, nonsensical story — one he’s told before — about going to Ground Zero just after terrorists flew two commercial jets into the twin towers. In the story, which no one has been able to verify, despite multiple attempts, he says firefighters had to carry him out of One Liberty Plaza, also known as the U.S. Steel Building, because they thought it was about to collapse.
As CNN fact checker Daniel Dale notes, there’s no evidence Trump went into this building, especially at a time when NYPD and NYFD had locked down the area. There’s no evidence that building was collapsing — in fact, it was deemed structurally sound and reopened within two months of the attacks. There’s no evidence he was carried out of it by firefighters.
But the lie isn’t even the worst part. Pretend it was all true — why would the leader of our country, and a New Yorker, decide to make that tragic day about himself?
Because that’s who Donald Trump is. He’s a malignant narcissist.
He’s also, incidentally, a terrible and ineffectual president, who’s made ill-fated decisions that he has to keep defending, and there’s nothing he won’t do to make himself look and feel better.
Within the first two minutes of his speech, he was cravenly using 9/11 to justify and promote his dumb war in Iran — two events separated by 25 years and 6,000 miles.
“And I will tell you, we’re right now fighting because we have a certain nation that wanted a nuclear weapon, they were very close to getting it, and now they have no chance at getting it. They will never have a nuclear weapon. Iran will not have a nuclear weapon. And they’ve been punished greatly. As you know, we’ve really taken it to them.”
As a New Yorker who lived through 9/11, still one of the worst days of my life, I’m utterly sickened by Trump’s crass, political, and self-promotional framing of that awful day.
And I’m relieved he won’t be given a platform to do it again on Friday’s anniversary in lower Manhattan.
Because for Trump, everything is his for the taking, and absolutely nothing is sacred.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.