Early voting has begun in most states and there are only five days until Election Day. Patriotic bunting rises in the library; people put tiny American flags in flower pots; and criminals, crooks and the Republican presidential candidate are getting into the spirit of the season by launching campaigns of election disruption and interference.

Donald Trump shared on his Truth Social account that Pennsylvania, perhaps the most critical state this cycle, has seen fraud at “large-scale levels rarely seen before.”

It’s easy to read this as an expression of simple panic: Perhaps Trump has been given bad news by his team and is starting to sow division ahead of an expected loss in the state. But Trump doesn’t just claim fraud when he loses. in 2016 sad Saying he lost the popular vote, Trump claimed he overcame widespread voter fraud to win the presidency. Even that started a commission By administrative order to investigate the alleged fraud. IT dispersed without finding anything.

Trump campaign, RNC and Senate candidate Dave McCormick filed a lawsuit against Bucks County, a suburb of Philadelphia that often serves as a bellwether in presidential elections, following reports that some residents were turned away at early voting centers. County officials claimed it was just a “communication error” and that voters were being accommodated appropriately.