The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep‎. Discussions about content and potential merging can still take place at the article and on its talk page. Eddie891 Talk Work 02:20, 5 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Election denial movement[edit]

Election denial movement (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)
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"Election denial movement" is a phrase sometimes used in reliable sources to refer to attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election. While the topic of that article is a notable and clearly defined one, this article synthesises ideas from some sources that use the phrase, and many that don't, to propose an expansive definition that none of them directly support. In other words, this article substantially overlaps with another article, and where its scope extends beyond that article it does so by making claims and inferences that aren't supported by the sources it cites. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 16:08, 14 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz Read! Talk! 21:29, 21 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Yes reliable sources are studying the election denial movement: (1) Brookings Institute (Nov 15 2022) describes it : "The recent election was very bad for the election denier movement, and the election of Katie Hobbs as governor of Arizona completed the bad news. Hobbs...held the line against people who, like their leader Donald Trump, believed that there was massive corruption in the 2020 election. In the years since, they believed that by “fixing” the system, Trump could win in 2024. By sowing unfounded doubt about election administration in many places, they created a threat to democracy....we identified 345 candidates running on a platform of election denial.... Overall, 226 election deniers or 66% won their races." see online published statement (2) Also: "The election denial movement is the culmination of years of partisan wrangling over the rules that govern elections along with increasing skepticism about the reliability...." [from Sautter, Chris. "US Democracy Survives a Challenge." in Campaigns and Elections American Style (Routledge, 2023) pp. 33-51.]; (3) "The election denial movement began with the Tea Party’s formation around the time of President Obama’s first election, fueled by White Christian Republican fear of losing power." [Smolar, Andrew I. "How Group Identifications Have Contributed to Our National Discord." Group 47#12 (2023): 115-147.] Rjensen (talk) 21:50, 26 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
MarkiPoli please see the version of the article that existed at the time this AfD was opened.[2] The article has been substantially altered since then. It is now a completely different article, and I again ask Superb Owl to roll back their major changes so everyone here is reading from the same sheet of music regarding this AfD dated October 14. Liz, because you relisted this AfD, I request your attention to this matter, as I believe this process has been corrupted such that we cannot know if editors are discussing the original AfD version or the current version that is substantially different. soibangla (talk) 04:57, 27 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That version is *better*, although the first sentence arguably violates NPOV and is kind of clunky, it would be better just starting out at 2020 and going through the events since then and the movement it started. The eventual article should probably be closer to that revision than the current version in my opinion. My view has not changed, the article should be kept but improved and retitled, imo "Election denialism in the United States" is not specific enough to the fact this is a Trump and Republican party phenomenon. There's other party candidates that have claimed fraud/rigging such as Stacey Abrams, but at that point you would have to make it a list article as they are totally unrelated apart from the fact they claimed fraud, which you can do for any number of reasons, unlike the clear line you can draw between 2020, increased voting restrictions in red states, Kari Lake, coming up to 2024, etc. You can't do all of that on the 2020 overturning article, which is already too long. MarkiPoli (talk) 06:54, 27 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Soibangla Synthesis is about the whole and not just the parts. Please provide a single source that has an overarching narrative that reflects the overarching narrative of this article and ties all of the composite parts together in the way this one has. There isn’t one. Hence original synthesis.4meter4 (talk) 04:25, 28 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
4meter4, are you arguing that our articles must have an overarching narrative supported by just one overarching source? you seem to argue that if I cannot produce one source that encompasses the entire article and ties all of the composite parts together then the entire article is invalid. is that commonly seen on Wikipedia? the overarching narrative of this article is that an "election denial movement" exists, and several reliable sources explicitly say so and discuss the phenomenon in a variety of perspectives and contexts. can you demonstrate there is an overarching "A and B, therefore, C" of synth here? can you demonstrate that synth exists in even an isolated case in the article, like a sentence or paragraph? soibangla (talk) 04:54, 28 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Thus far editors have asserted the article is synth, OR, biased, POV, soapbox, a college essay, makes claims and inferences that aren't supported by the sources it cites, and propose[s] an expansive definition that none of [the sources] directly support, though the article contains several reliable sources that directly and explicitly reference "election denial movement" as a defined term. Editors have thrown the book at the article. I have asked three times for editors to provide concrete evidence to support these characterizations, yet none has been forthcoming. Nothing. Where's the beef? soibangla (talk) 20:47, 27 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I doubt any admin will delete this article. Abductive (reasoning) 21:02, 27 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Since opinion is divided and the discussion is still very active, I'm relisting this discussion again. Due to some complaints about participants judging this article based on its current condition versus the state is was at the time of nomination, I've temporarily reverted the article back to its original condition. By looking at my edit, you can see the entirety of the changes made. I've never taken this bold action before when reviewing an AFD discussion but I do see my edit as a temporary reversion that can be undone when this AFD is closed. I encourage those seeking deletion of this article to respond to questions posed to them about specific problems that exist or assert that the entire article is irredeemable. Because I've taken a bold action that some might view as problematic, I will not be closing this AFD discussion. I should also add that this article, unfortunately, has been moved during this discussion so its current name is Election denial movement in the United States. Moving during an AFD is discouraged as it complicates relistings and discussion closure.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz Read! Talk! 23:07, 28 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, @Liz and apologies for my earlier editing on the page.

1) this movement pre-existed efforts to overturn the 2020 election (2012, 2016, arguably origins in birtherism challenging Obama's legitimacy)
2) other election results have been denied (2022 AZ, analysts predict this will happen in future elections as well...)
3) it would be synthesis to assume everyone in this movement agrees with the goals (let alone methods) of those trying to overturn the 2020 election results. Just because there is overlap and the election denial movement appears to be being heavily recruited from for attempts to overturn the 2020 election, it's not a 1:1 equation. Superb Owl (talk) 19:26, 29 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. I stated that this was a temporary reversion and knew that I could be reverted. I've never taken an action like this on the hundreds of other AFDs I've reviewed. Besides this comment, I will not be taking any further action on this AFD discussion. Liz Read! Talk! 05:02, 31 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I remain strongly for KEEP. The main original complaint was the concentration of the USA and the new title completely solves that problem. Denialism is a major force in US politics and it now pertains to future elections -- that is a new and powerful phenomenon in US politics. As far as I can see no prominent Democrats support it, but it does have some support among the rank and file Democrats. Polls show lots of independents do support it so its is not exclusively a GOP issue. Here is a 2023 scholarly study finding deep roots : "Among Republicans, conspiracism has a potent effect on embracing election denialism, followed by racial resentment. Among independents, the strongest influences on denialism are Christian nationalism and racial resentment. And, although election denialism is rare among Democrats, what variation does exist is mostly explained by levels of racial resentment." [source: Charles Stewart III, "Public Opinion Roots of Election Denialism" (January 4, 2023). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4318153 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4318153] (I am adding this quote to the article). Rjensen (talk) 19:12, 30 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree that all instances of someone saying an election was fraudulent or stolen should be in this article. If it is, then its a list article that should be titled "List of disputed elections in the United States" or something similar. This article should be solely about the Republican efforts led by Donald Trump since 2020, and the title should be something like "Republican Party election denial movement". At this point, this AfD has gone severely off the rails, the article is now much worse off (opposite of what AfD is supposed to do) and a bit of the old WP:TNT might be needed to get it back on track. Although I do still think this article is needed and can take some word count off Attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election. For example, the "background" section of that article could be condensed there and details put here instead. MarkiPoli (talk) 15:39, 1 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@MarkiPoli list already exists at Contested elections in American history. rootsmusic (talk) 16:32, 1 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting. That article needs serious work as well. You could definitely expand that to cover other elections. You could have presidential elections as a heading and the individual elections as subheadings. Then you can have congress, governor, and whatever else. Anyway I think this furthers my point this article should only be about the current Republican Party efforts to deny the legitimacy of elections and voting. MarkiPoli (talk) 16:47, 1 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
We have articles on electoral fraud, transport and computer security, but notably we don't have articles called electoral fraud movement, transport movement or computer security movement. Election denial exists (bracketing the question of whether it's a notable phenomenon), but this article makes the very different, and unsubstantiated, claim that an "election denial movement" exists. – Arms & Hearts (talk) 13:56, 2 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, election denialism is a conspiracy theory that has been propagated by election deniers for many years. Unfortunately, election denialism is combined into Attempts to overturn the 2020 United States presidential election and contributes to making that article too long. Like @MarkiPoli commented yesterday, that article should split (WP:Splitting) off its sub-sections about conspiracies into a separate article. But discussions about that article should be redirected to its own Talk Page. rootsmusic (talk) 15:43, 2 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

बिनोद थारू (talk) 00:32, 3 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

  • Comment: editors should give strong consideration to a merge, looking at the unique conent in this article and its sourcing quality and how it will fit in the target.  // Timothy :: talk  15:35, 4 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.