From Moscow to Beijing: Why America Keeps Changing its Electoral Villain

Washington does not have an election-interference problem; rather, it has a designated-rival problem, and this week China simply took Russia’s old seat.

A Script Written Eight Years Ago

What is novel about Trump’s 2026 speech is that the seat has passed to Beijing alone, and the timing is instructive: the 2026 speech arrives as trade tensions with China sharpen and as Trump’s party faces a difficult November, with polling favoring Democrats to retake the House. The claim’s prominence does not track a steady accumulation of evidence over eight years. It tracks whichever country Washington currently needs to cast as its adversary.

How the Evidence Bent to Fit the Narrative

What Trump said in his speech to accuse China is one thing. What the US intelligence reports actually say is entirely different. In simple words, none of the reports support Trump’s claims that “China tried to influence outcomes” and that “your vote was stolen.”

American fact-checking organizations across the political spectrum reached similar conclusions within a day of the speech. PolitiFact and PBS both found that Trump quoted years-old, partially redacted intelligence documents without distinguishing between what analysts........

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