Donald Trump has repeatedly said the 2016 presidential election is "rigged." There's little evidence to support that claim, and both Democratic and Republican leaders have criticized Trump for making it. But he said it again Wednesday in a speech at Miami’s Bayfront Park.
"The system is rigged, remember that the system is rigged right now," Trump told the crowd. "We're gonna change it."
He also invoked the "rigged system" while talking about new emails being reviewed by the FBI in its investigation of Hillary Clinton's private email server.
"It’s about time. Remember, it’s a rigged system," he said. "She (Clinton) wants to blame everyone else for her mounting legal troubles but she really has no one to blame but herself."
Several Trump supporters at the rally said they're fearful of vote rigging, but don’t believe it’s widespread.
Perry Kapa's an air conditioning contractor from Fort Lauderdale who voted early for Trump. He said he’d seen a 60 Minutes episode about how a USB drive could be used to hack a voting machine. That made him rethink the ballot-scanning process.
"I hate to say it, but when I was scanning it in, I was worried the machine was compromised," Kapa said. “I don’t want to say 'rigged,' but there are some anomalies that are going on."
He says videos he’s seen online make him think election fraud could take place when votes are cast in the names of dead people. But Kapa says voter fraud probably affects both Trump and Clinton.
"It could go both ways," he said. He added, “It shouldn’t be that way. If we can vote on American Idol with our cell phones -- 80 million people -- why can’t we do that with our voting system?”
Joyce Todd is an Everglades tour boat captain from Naples. She also says she’s seen Internet videos of election fraud -- people going to vote for Trump and their votes being changed to Clinton. But Todd voted early -- for Trump -- without any issues.
"It was fine, it was fine. Paper ballot. No problem," she said. Todd said all the attention on election rigging might actually prevent voter fraud from taking place.
"I think what happened is, now that it’s being brought to people’s attention, maybe people will be more cognizant of it and watch where their vote goes," she said.
Both Todd and Kapa said that when they voted, they questioned poll workers about their ballots and the submission process.
Susan Tong, from Miami, said she understands why Trump might believe there's election rigging going on.
"He might think there’s cheating behind it because of things that may have happened in the past… during Nixon and JFK," she said, referring to the 1960 presidential election. At that time, Democrat John F. Kennedy defeated Republican Richard Nixon, and Republicans tried to overturn the results, claiming voter fraud in several states.
Tong said that today, she thinks, "there’s certain politicians that maybe have the power to swing certain votes.”
But widespread election rigging?
“I think the current system should be okay," she said. "Now we have voting regulation in every voting booth, people there to make sure everything run properly.
"Whatever the votes come out, I believe will be right."
