Drop-box tailgate parties are the latest rage
Ben Collins, on the NBC wingnutbeat has this:
By now, you’ve seen some of these “tailgate parties,” where Trump supporters hang around ballot drop boxes standing watch for “mules,” some in tactical gear.
My colleague @VaughnHillyard and I spent the week finding out the origin of this plan.
We found it. It was Truth Social.
These “drop box tailgate parties” took off earlier this month when a Truth Social influencer named Trumper Mel tweeted a picture of a man dropping off a single ballot at a Mesa, Az. drop box. Trump “retruthed” it.
But “mule parties” were in the works on Truth Social for months.
On July 22, in advance of the Arizona primary, a TruthSocial user with less than 100 followers suggested “tailgate parties” outside of drop boxes.
2020 election denial influencer named Seth Keshel was the only person to “retruth” it to his more than 50k followers. He added this:
Keshel’s post immediately caught fire on Telegram and Truth Social in July.
Within days, users were bragging they had “ran off mules” from casting ballots in the Arizona primary.
They called them “mule parties,” a reference to the discredited propaganda film 2,000 Mules.
Suddenly, “drop box tailgate parties” were everywhere on the pro-Trump internet. Gateway Pundit wrote it up.
But drop box intimidation for the primary wasn’t the main goal.
One Telegram influencer vowed a “future pow-wow in Arizona, come October early voting.”
Within weeks, Truth Social influencer Trumper Mel started propping up her group Clean Elections USA to “party” with “patriots” outside of drop boxes.
Her group has been haranguing people for such crimes like… backing their car up.
This was “retruthed” by Donald Trump.
Clean Elections USA and Trumper Mel, really a Tulsa-based preacher named Melody Jennings, are now being sued by the Arizona Alliance for Retired Americans and Voto Latino for engaging in “conduct that is clearly meant to intimidate” voters.
This is Jennings’ excuse.
What started as a meme on Truth Social now has conspiracy theorists haranguing voters and officials at drop boxes nationwide.
In PA, “concerned citizens went with the sheriff to open sealed boxes” and found ballots by people who used the drop box before its official opening.
The explanation is simple, according to local election officials: “We had a handful of voters who were a bit too eager and prematurely deposited their voted mail-in or absentee ballot.”
Those ballots are being put aside to be adjudicated by election workers. No conspiracy.
The “drop box tailgate parties” continue apace throughout the US, keeping watchful eye on voters who Trump supporters think look funny.
@VaughnHillyard counted 9 people outside one Arizona drop box on Wednesday night alone.
This guy was from the failed “freedom convoy.”
I can’t believe I still have to say this:
How and where people organize on the internet matters. It has direct, traceable real-world consequences.
“Dropbox tailgate parties” started as a meme on Truth Social. Now there are conspiracy theorists intimidating voters in real life.
Here’s my whole story with @VaughnHillyard on how “drop box tailgate parties” went from a meme on Truth Social to armed men standing watch over ballot boxes nationwide.
It happened because the platform allowed it. This platform might allow it soon.
Originally tweeted by Ben Collins (@oneunderscore__) on October 28, 2022.