As President Donald Trump stoked baseless claims of widespread voter fraud leading up to the 2020 election, technology companies rolled out a bevy of rules to clamp down on falsehoods.
But nearly two years after the 2020 vote, social media posts mentioning false claims that the tally was rigged or stolen are still widespread across major platforms including Facebook, Twitter and TikTok, according to a report shared exclusively with the Washington Post.
The findings underscore that technology companies are still grappling with a flood of baseless claims about voter fraud in 2020, even as the 2022 midterm elections rapidly approach.
A report by Advance Democracy, a nonprofit organization that studies misinformation, found that candidates endorsed by Trump and those associated with the QAnon conspiracy theory have posted about election fraud hundreds of times on Facebook and Twitter, drawing hundreds of thousands of interactions and retweets.
On TikTok, six hashtags promoting conspiracy theories about the 2020 tally being rigged or stolen have garnered more than 38 million views as of July. Two of the most popular, researchers found, make references to a documentary by conservative commentator Dinesh D’Souza that fact-checkers have found makes misleading and unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud.
“Our democracy is based on accepting legitimate election outcomes and honoring the peaceful transition of power,” said Daniel Jones, president of Advance Democracy. “But months...
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