Election Deniers Not Contesting Their Massive Losses

Election Day 2026 started off with election deniers claiming voter fraud was happening everywhere. But hours later, after a historic sweep of House and Senate races by Democrats, election deniers on the ballot were silent and made no real claims that the vote was rigged.

For months, election deniers had alleged without evidence that the vote would be rigged to flip results in favor of Democrats, that mail-in ballots would be compromised, and that a wave of noncitizens would vote in such numbers to alter the outcome of the election.

None of this happened, and in reality the country appeared to roundly reject the policies implemented by President Donald Trump and his administration.

For months, hundreds of election deniers in state and federal races had campaigned on promises to investigate past elections or overhaul voting procedures. But a WIRED review of some of the most pivotal races involving election deniers found that almost all of them lost and none of them, or the network of activists and groups backing them, have raised any questions about the results.

In Arizona’s governor race, Andy Biggs, who was among the members of Congress who challenged the 2020 election results on January 6, 2021, conceded to incumbent Democrat Katie Hobbs and made no mention of voter fraud or election rigging. Instead, he blamed voters not turning out to vote: “We just didn’t get our turnout quite as full as we wanted to.”

Mike Rogers, who was running for a Senate seat in Michigan against Abdul El-Sayed, had been a critic of Trump’s election denial comments, but in the months leading up to Tuesday’s vote had begun to voice skepticism about the security of America’s elections. In the end it didn’t matter, as Rogers was decisively defeated. Rogers has not publicly commented on the outcome of the election, and did not respond to a request for comment.

In Wisconsin, Tom Tiffany, who objected to certifying Joe Biden’s election victory in 2020, was beaten by his Democrat opponent David Crowley in the race for governor. Just weeks before the midterms, Tiffany had welcomed the FBI’s baseless investigation into the state’s elections. On Tuesday night, Tiffany conceded defeat without any reference to election rigging.

In Ohio, billionaire Vivek Ramaswamy, who baselessly said in the past that the 2020 US presidential election was stolen by “big tech,” lost his race for governor to Amy Acton. On Tuesday night, Ramaswamy told his supporters that he had called his opponent to concede defeat and wish her well. He did not mention election rigging or voter fraud.

Jim Marchant, a Trump-endorsed serial election denier who promised to deregister every single Nevadan if he was elected as secretary of state, lost his election to incumbent Cisco Aguilar. Marchant has not commented publicly on the results and did not respond to a request for comment.

In Colorado, Republican secretary of state candidate James Wiley—who calls himself the Red Flame of Liberty—made undermining trust in elections a centerpiece of his campaign. On Tuesday he was roundly defeated by Amanda Gonzalez. Wiley conceded to his opponent on Tuesday night without questioning the results, and added that he was now planning to run for the chair of the Colorado Republican Party. “I think Colorado is really frustrated with the two-party system, frustrated with the results they’ve been getting from the Republican party, and there is definitely time for change,” Wiley said after conceding. “That is the signal to the Republican party, we’ve been doing something wrong … Maybe we need to rewind, maybe all the way back to Lincoln.”

In Pennsylvania, representative Scott Perry, whom the January 6 Committee found to have been directly involved in attempts to overturn the 2020 election results, lost his seat to Democrat Janelle Stelson. When asked on Tuesday morning by a local news outlet if he would accept the results, Perry said, “I sure hope so.” Perry has not commented publicly about the results and his campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

There were, however, some election deniers who did win races on Tuesday, including Byron Donalds, the Trump-backed candidate for Florida governor. During the 2024 election, Donalds had refused to say he would accept the results, but on Tuesday night, when thanking his supporters, he made no reference to issues about voter fraud or election rigging.

These candidates, however, were just one part of a vast election denier network that has emerged since 2020. As the results emerged on Tuesday evening, this network of groups and activists, which have been posting nonstop for months about the threats to US elections, went silent.

True the Vote, the election denial group who provided some data behind the debunked 2000 Mules film about ballot stuffing in the 2020 election, posted dozens of times on X while voting was open on Tuesday, boosting claims about supposed irregularities at polling locations across the country. In the hours since the results came out however, the group’s account has remained silent.

Similarly, Scott Presler, a prominent MAGA activist, spent Tuesday boosting claims about voting issues at polling locations across the country. But when the results came in, he simply wrote: “I think it would have been a good idea to pass the SAVE America Act,” referring to the legislation Trump failed to get passed that would have disenfranchised millions of Americans.

Cleta Mitchell, the founder and chairman of the Election Integrity Network and has worked closely with the administration to undermine US elections, has also not posted since the election results came in.

Seth Keshel, a superstar in the election denial community who has also allegedly briefed White House officials on voting irregularities, posted repeatedly about the results on Tuesday night but never once questioned the outcomes. Meanwhile Patrick Byrne, the Overstock.com founder who has funded large parts of the election denial community, has not mentioned the midterm results on his social media accounts.

The biggest election denial superstar of them all was not, for his part, silent. Late on the night of the election, Trump called in to Fox News and congratulated Democrats on their victory.