Elections Have Always Been Rigged, but Not Like Trump Says
Consider this: In 2012, black voters waited in line twice as long as white voters to cast a ballot. In key swing states like Florida, the largest polling place delays occurred in districts with larger minority populations. Districts with more Spanish speakers also experienced longer lines. And research shows that in 2012, somewhere between 500,000 and 700,000 eligible voters decided not to vote because of problems at their polling places, including wait times.
“It has an economic cost,” says Charles Stewart, a professor of political science at MIT and one of the leading researchers on voting lines and voting technologies, who estimates that some $1 billion in productivity was lost in 2012 due to people waiting in lines. “But whatever the cost is, it lands disproportionately more on some people than others, and that’s unfair.”
So in a way, you could say elections have been rigged all along—just not in the way Trump envisions it and certainly not against the people who are most likely to vote for him this November.
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