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Twitter late Monday flagged a tweet from Donald Trump, claiming unsubstantiated that a recent Supreme Court decision would lead to voter fraud, as misinformation.
Just hours before Election Day, Trump tweeted Without any merit that last week’s decision that leaves, for now, a state supreme court decision that allows election officials to count ballots that arrive up to three days after Election Day “will allow a trap unbridled and uncontrolled ”. That decision, Trump said, “will provoke violence in the streets.”
Twitter added a disclaimer to Trump’s tweet, saying its content was “disputed” and “could be misleading.”
“We put a warning in the Tweet you referenced for making a potentially misleading statement about an election, ”said a Twitter spokesperson. “This action is in line with our Civic integrity policy, and as is standard with this warning, we will significantly restrict interactions on this Tweet. “
The social media platform has removed tweets containing “false or misleading information intended to undermine public confidence in an election or other civic process,” “controversial claims” that could undermine faith in the process, and “misleading claims” about the result of an election. It also does not allow retweets of these publications. Users can quote-tweet some of them to add context.
In September, Twitter post a “public interest” notice in another tweet from Trump who shared misinformation about the vote.
Both Trump and Biden campaigned in Pennsylvania on Monday, indicating the critical role of the state in this election. Recent polls have shown that Biden leads in the state by an average of about 5 points.
Trump, however, has been laying the groundwork to fight the election results in court. “As soon as the election is over, we are going to go to our lawyers,” Trump recently told supporters in North Carolina. “But we don’t want to have Pennsylvania, where there is a political governor, a very partisan guy … We don’t want to be in a position where he is allowed, every day, to watch the ballots arrive. “Wow, we could only find 10,000 more ballots,” Trump said.
State Gov. Tom Wolf responded Monday to the president’s comments that unsubstantiated insinuations that Wolf and other Democratic governors were involved in “cheating” and that Trump and his supporters were “watching.” “Pennsylvanians will not be intimidated,” Wolf said. “You can see us count every vote and have a fair election.”
Voter fraud is extremely rare. It is the policy – not “unchecked cheating” – of various states to count ballots that arrive after Election Day, with specific rules that vary.
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