PolitiFact hammered for arguing Dems’ stolen election claims about 2016 race were 'mostly symbolic'

Conservatives torched PolitiFact on Monday after the fact-checking outlet debunked a claim that Democratic Party leaders argued that past elections were stolen by Republicans, arguing those claims were just "symbolic."

Thus, they shouldn’t be taken as seriously as Republicans’ claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen.

PolitiFact writer Jill Terreri Ramos went after Rep. Lee Zeldin’s claim from earlier this month, which said, "Every time a Republican has been elected president over the last few decades, House Democrats have objected to the result."

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Ramos’ fact-check claimed, "House Democrats have objected to presidential election results, though under different circumstances." 

The corresponding PolitiFact tweet stated, "U.S. House Democrats made objections to election results in 2001, 2005 and 2017, when the losing candidate had already conceded. They were mostly symbolic measures."

In her piece, she wrote, "Attempts to object to election results have been made in some fashion by House Democrats in 2001, 2005, and 2017, following the successful campaigns of George W. Bush and Trump, both Republicans. One senator supported the objection in 2005, though the Senate and the House ultimately did not uphold that objection."

So Zeldin is correct, though according to Ramos, these objections to those elections were different from Republicans’ 2020 objections for a couple of reasons. "Unlike Republican objections in 2021, Democratic objections in the 2000s happened after the losing candidate had conceded. In 2021, Trump did not concede until the evening of Jan. 7, and he had been plotting to remain in the White House."

Citing Brookings Institute senior fellow Norman Eisen, Ramos added, "In prior years, ‘the losing candidate didn’t support any of these objections.’" Eisen noted, "Here, Trump drove those objections."

Though conservatives weren’t convinced that this erased the hypocrisy of Democrat leaders’ having made claims that previous elections were stolen.

Former Republican congressional candidate David Giglio tweeted, "And the ‘protests’ that burned down majority minority neighborhoods and businesses were ‘mostly peaceful.’ @PolitiFact continues to be a complete [clown] show."

Rep. Dan Bishop, R-N.C., responded to the claim with a video of himself mocking the phrase "fact-check" at a congressional hearing. The video depicts the congressman sarcastically saying the words "fact-check" and then laughing hysterically. 

The Federalist co-founder Sean Davis blasted the central claim of the fact-check, tweeting, "The ‘different circumstances’ were that Democrats lost those elections."

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Conservative columnist Tim Young was simply fine with Politifact admitting that Democrats questioned elections in the first place. He tweeted, "Sooo... Democrats have been proven to be election denying insurrectionists... got it."

TownHall.com columnist Brad Slager remarked, "That ‘insurrectionists threatening the sanctity of democracy by questioning our elections’ standard sure seems conveniently fluid."

Conservative author Vanessa Castro tweeted, "’They were mostly symbolic measures’ isn’t a fact. It’s literally an opinion."

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