Veteran fact-checker shreds the 5 excuses Trump will use if the GOP gets crushed

President Donald Trump hasn’t yet blamed Democratic cheating for Tuesday’s midterm results, but one of the country’s best-known fact-checkers has already debunked the claims he expects Trump to make.

Glenn Kessler, who previously ran the Washington Post’s Fact Checker, laid out a “prebuttal” in an MS NOW column on Election Day identifying and debunking five false accusations Trump is likely to make if Republicans lose.

“Consistency has never been President Donald Trump’s strong suit, but he has been consistent about one thing,” Kessler wrote. “If Republicans do poorly in Tuesday’s midterm elections, as polls suggest they will, he is prepared to blame Democratic cheating.”

Kessler said he once compiled 30,000 words of prewritten fact checks based on Trump’s habits, and for this column he drew on the president’s speeches, news conferences and Truth Social posts from 2025 and 2026.

First up are claims that late-counted mail ballots stole Republican victories. Kessler explained that leads shift on election night because of the order in which votes are counted. “A changing lead is not evidence of fabricated votes,” he wrote. He cited a Brookings Institution study that found mail-ballot fraud accounted for just 0.000043 percent of mail ballots cast.

He also pointed out Trump’s inconsistency on the issue. The president warned in August of “fake mail-in ballots” in Michigan, then released a video in October urging supporters to “vote by mail.” He also cast his own Florida ballot by mail last month. Kessler noted that the Supreme Court blocked an administration effort to give the Postal Service more power to restrict mail voting for the midterms.

Second, Kessler took on Trump’s claims of mass noncitizen voting. Trump has alleged that 35,152 noncitizens were registered in New Jersey, all of them Democrats. The state’s preliminary review found roughly 6,600 improper registrations and up to 400 voters. According to FactCheck.org, that’s too few to change any federal race.

Third, he dismissed Trump’s claim that Democrats receive “six or seven ballots in one household.” Getting more than one ballot doesn’t mean a voter can cast more than one vote, Kessler noted, pointing to Maryland’s uniquely identified return envelopes.

Fourth, he warned that Trump’s July prime time speech about “shocking vulnerabilities in our election infrastructure” appeared designed to lay the groundwork for blaming GOP losses on foreign interference or voting machines. There is no credible evidence that any foreign government has flipped votes in a U.S. election.

Finally, Kessler rejected Trump’s argument that Democratic opposition to his stalled SAVE America Act proves they “want to continue to cheat.” States without photo ID laws use other ways to verify voters, he wrote.

“Opposing a proposal does not establish fraudulent intent — except in Trump’s mind,” Kessler wrote.