Hard to say historically when was the first time the Dems "cheated on a large scale." It was associated with big city machine politics (mostly Democrats) in the late 19th and early 20th century. But it was more geared then to local elections, where relatively few votes were more likely to be a determining factor because there were relatively fewer votes cast.
Then there was the infamous LBJ ballot box stuffing in the Texas Dem Senate primary race in 1948.
The first time it was widely mentioned in a presidential race was in connection with the Daley machine in Illinois in the Kennedy-Nixon election of 1960.
With the advent of the Clinton administration in 1993, there were several voting "reforms" introduced by federal legislation, such as Motor Voter. That period also saw the beginning of early voting in some states. Both of those aided and abetted cheating and fraud schemes.
In the wake of the disputed 2000 Bush-Gore election came the "Help America Vote Act." That was bipartisan, IIRC, but I don't know why the country needed any "help" from the federal government to vote at that time. I don't recall the specifics, but my gut feeling is that on balance it aided and abetted fraud and cheating as well.
Then in the last two decades, a few states have gone to such monstrosities as all-mail in ballots and same-day registration (most recently, Colorado), both of which compromise election integrity for convenience.
My guess is that in the Obama election "victory" in 2012, fraud and cheating targeted to the swing states might have determined the outcome. Then and since, Romney and his campaign never uttered a word about it, even with such obvious signs such as Romney getting ZERO votes in some precincts in Philadelphia and Cleveland.
Still the GOP ignores it.
I'd agree if you're talking about the Washington GOP establishment. The National Republican Committee, some say, is bound by some legal agreement it made in a 1980s civil suit where they supposedly agreed not to challenge election fraud and cheating, but I'm not sure of the details. "True the Vote" isn't the only organization out there trying to combat the cheating. There are a handful of other organizations, and there are a few lawyers and small legal firms who are into combatting election fraud and cheating as well. And of course, let's not forget Kris Kobach and a few other GOP Secretaries of State who have worked in the same direction.
We’ve had a lot of election fraud convictions in Michigan over the past few years. It started with the Oakland county democrats who ran the fake tea party scam that targeted the candidates for SOS and AG who went on to win.
These days we have democrats turning each other in for vote fraud.
That is a very good summation. Like you, I couldn’t pinpoint exactly when Dems’ large scale cheating actually started. I think perhaps, though, Al Franken marked a turning point. The fraud there was so very obvious. They just kept finding ballots—at one point in the trunk of a car—until they had enough. During the actual theft of the election Republicans were eerily silent. After the Franken ‘victory’ was a done deal one or two made weak statements.
The lesson for the Dems was, ‘Hells bells—we can steal even major, crucial elections flagrantly, right out in the open & nothing happens. We get an additional, indispensable senator, & the GOP just looks weak and stupid’.
After that the spigot opened, and fraud poured out like a thousand broken water mains.
Thanks for the ping!
Thanks justiceseeker93.