On November 6, 2024, the word "recount" began to trend of X shortly after Donald Trump was elected the 47th president of the United States. It stemmed from theories about 20 million missing votes in the 2024 election.
Social media users were encumbered with two conflicting theories of election fraud. One theory, shared in a string of social media posts, repeated false claims about 2020 voter fraud, fueled by Donald Trump.
The other viral social media posts questioned how Vice President Kamala Harris could have received 20 million fewer votes in 2024 than President Joe Biden in 2020.
However, social media users zeroed in on the 20 million vote gap between Harris and Biden. The author of popular Louise Moscow spy thrillers, Lorraine Evanoff, highlighted that 20 million votes are missing. In a viral post, she wrote:
“20 million votes are MISSING. We saw the record turnout with our own eyes.”
In another tweet, viewed over 2 million times, she added:
“There are 20 million votes MISSING. No way there were 20 million fewer votes than in 2020 with a massive 25 million surge in voter registration and record turnout.”
Several social media users also began sharing posts about 20 million votes missing, alleging Trump cheated. However, this is false. Associated Press, citing election officials, reported that although Trump won the election with 277 electoral votes, some states have not counted every popular vote.
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency director Jen Easterly in a statement said,
“As we have said repeatedly, our election infrastructure has never been more secure and the election community never better prepared to deliver safe, secure, free, and fair elections for the American people.”
Recount trends on X over 20 million votes missing claims
The calls for a recount were spurred by viral tweets alleging 20 million votes were missing. A post with over 300,000 views read:
“Everyone demand a recount. 20 million votes don’t just come up missing on their own.”
Another tweet with over 900,000 views read:
“Me liking and reposting every tweet that says Trump cheated and we should recount.”
Netizens pointed out that President Joe Biden won approximately 20 million more votes in the 2020 election than Kamala Harris had secured in 2024. However, there is no evidence to back up the claim of 20 million missing votes.
Associated Press reported votes from the November 5, 2024 election are still being counted. For instance, the state of California, which was declared for Kamala Harris, only counted 55 percent of the votes at the time of writing this article.
Once the counting is finished millions of more votes will be added to the total.
In 2020, it took four days to count the ballots and declare Joe Biden the winner of the election. At the time, Biden did not have a majority (270 or more) in electoral votes to be declared the winner.
However, since Trump had a significant lead in the key battleground states he was declared the winner. Trump was declared the 47th president of the United States after he won 277 electoral votes on November 5, 2024.
As counting continued on November 6, 2024, Trump secured 295 electoral votes while Kamala Harris earned 226.
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At the time of declaring a winner, Trump had around 70 million popular votes and Harris secured around 65 million.
As vote counting continues, Harris has around 67 million popular votes and Trump secured over 72 million. As votes are still being counted, any comparison to the previous election, alleging 20 million missing votes, would be false.
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