Who’s Watching the Watchers: How ‘Fact-Checkers’ Meddle in Elections

Who’s Watching the Watchers: How ‘Fact-Checkers’ Meddle in Elections
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testifies remotely during a Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee hearing with big tech companies in Washington on Oct. 28, 2020. (Greg Nash/Pool/Getty Images)
David Bolls
11/14/2020
Updated:
11/17/2020
Commentary

I want to provide a brief look at techniques borrowed, in part, from what’s referred to in national security quarters as “information warfare,” and how some of these techniques are actually being utilized by so-called “fact-checkers” during our hotly contested 2020 election.

Election integrity is crucial to our democracy, and since a veritable cottage industry of self-styled “impartial” fact-checkers has mushroomed to such an extent that it now attempts to, in effect, umpire national discourse, it’s worthwhile to consider what happens when no one “watches the watchers.”

Part of information warfare involves employing selective and intentionally misleading information, as well as deceptive measures operating under the guise of apparent legitimacy, to effect an outcome. Certain legal professions and opposition research firms employ similar techniques to score victories against opponents that couldn’t otherwise be won on merit and justice alone.

The nation is well aware of the widespread alleged irregularities in receiving and counting mail-in votes post-election. In Pennsylvania, in particular, being the disputed state that carries the highest number of electoral votes, allegations that poll-watchers weren’t allowed meaningful access to observe post-election ballot dump counting are very serious. If the evidence is presented cogently, it should initiate Department of Justice involvement and Supreme Court-mandated recounts in key battleground states in question.

Right away, CNN fact-checkers rushed to inform the nation that poll-watchers weren’t hindered. Let’s pay close attention to the following to see how agenda-driven “fact-checkers” operate utilizing the techniques mentioned above.

In an age where algorithms created by a small group of young Silicon Valley employees decide what people see online and what gets buried or censored, it’s important to understand how “fact-checking” plays into this. The following techniques employed on the question of whether or not poll-watchers were hindered exemplify a somewhat standard practice used by the “fact-checkers.”

First, affirm a basic yet vague fact: Poll-watchers were unhindered during the election. The CNN fact-checker is technically partially accurate on this. However, it’s severely misleading, since the critical issue in question isn’t the period during the election, but rather post-election. The fact-checkers, being intelligent people, of course, know this, yet blur the distinction by withholding the full state of affairs from their audience.

Later on, when they do mention post-election counting, our fact-checkers then go on to state that some poll-watchers were allowed in the building, and, therefore, case closed: The Trump campaign allegations are deemed “false.” But what they again cleverly withhold from their readership is that the issue isn’t that poll-watchers couldn’t enter the building, but that they were kept so far from the poll counters that they had no meaningful observational access in key counting areas.

In fact, once the local Philadelphia court ruled that poll-watchers could enter the building and be six feet from the counters (itself a red flag that they even had to go to court to get this access in the first place), the poll-watchers noted that the Democrat-led vote counters then proceeded to move the stations further from the viewing section. Again, none of these details were noted by our fact-checkers.

In essence, there was no meaningful access at all in key counting areas, and this alone is a significant breach of election law and calls into question the integrity of an election hanging in the balance. Further recent trends showing a highly suspicious jump in candidate Biden’s numbers in key areas simply don’t square with previous elections and are suspicious enough to warrant court intervention.

Someone relying on the “fact-checkers” would be misled and lulled into accepting a false narrative that everything is normal. I think we’ll rightly see this go to the Supreme Court.

Freedom is not free, and groups aren’t always what they profess to be, though the word “fact” is in their very title. The Ministry of Truth in George Orwell’s classic “1984” comes to mind as a caution for all Americans. The weaponization of agenda-driven “fact-checking” is further discrediting the platforms that use it.

Gone are the days when members on opposite sides of the aisle could debate highway bills and military spending yet go golfing together afterward.

Our very foundations are now at odds. We are entering a period where discernment is needed more than ever. Five of the six media empires controlling almost all information flow are thoroughly soaked in an aggressively secular leftist worldview that trickles down to their anchors, reporters, and so-called fact-checkers, significantly shaping how the public and even government leaders consume information.

Enormous pressure and groupthink are now being exerted by the same groups that wanted the United States to believe President Donald Trump was down 16 points in the polls to convince people there’s nothing to see here—move along—no irregularities, it’s all been “fact-checked.”

However, I believe they miscalculated and underestimated a surviving American spirit that will always identify with the Founding Fathers’ fight for freedom. This spirit has been steadily evolving from a silent majority since the latter Obama years into becoming now less naïve, more outspoken, and actually promoting a new wave of motivated men and women who see themselves as patriots and vigilant guardians of liberty, justice, and truth.

To understand this is to understand where we are in America today. In short, the pollsters and fact-checkers didn’t come clean with the American people and greatly misled the public on the numbers. Ensuring our election process is fair and free of corruption is a cause all Americans should champion at this hour, not only to defend our own electoral integrity but also to be an example to the rest of the world fighting for the same at the ballot box.

David Bolls currently works in the field of national security in Washington.
Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.
David Bolls currently works in the field of national security in Washington, D.C.
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