Forthcoming research in Public Choice: Simple tests for the extent of vote fraud with absentee and provisional ballots in the 2020 US presidential election
Dr. John Lott’s research on vote fraud has been accepted at the academic journal Public Choice. People can download and read the paper available here. I think that this is research that will be getting some attention.
Abstract
This study reports three tests measuring vote fraud in the 2020 US presidential election, although they provide inconsistent evidence. To isolate the impact of a county’s vote-counting process and potential fraud on candidates’ vote margins, I first compare voting precincts in a county with alleged fraud to adjacent precincts in neighboring counties with no allegations of fraud. I compute the differences in President Trump’s vote shares on absentee ballots in those adjacent precincts, controlling for the differences in his vote shares on ballots cast in person. I also control for registered voters’ demographics and compare data for the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections. When I examine Georgia and Pennsylvania separately, weak evidence of vote fraud on absentee ballots is found. However, combining the samples produces significant results and implies at least 10,000 additional votes for Biden in Pennsylvania’s Allegheny and Georgia’s Fulton counties. I then apply the same method to provisional ballots in Allegheny County, where, contrary to state law, voters were allowed to correct alleged defects in absentee ballots by submitting provisional ballots on Election Day. My analysis finds that such permission contributed to a statistically significant additional 6,700 votes for Biden. Finally, vote fraud can show up as artificially larger voter turnouts, higher rates of filling out absentee ballots for people who hadn’t voted, dead people voting, ineligible people voting, or payments for votes. The estimates for Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin combined indicate an average of 255,000 excess votes for Biden.
Keywords: Vote fraud, absentee ballots, voter turnout rate, provisional ballots, presidential electionJEL Classification: D72, D73, K16
