(Washington) Questionable theories, a new documentary claims to reveal how the 2020 presidential election was “stolen” from Donald Trump. Despite the warnings of experts, it is a hit at the American box office.
Posted at 10:17 a.m.
Since its release at the end of May, 2000 slippersthe short film by Dinesh D’Souza – a director convicted of violating campaign finance laws before being pardoned by the former president – has already garnered more than $1.2 million in US theaters.
Large buckets of popcorn in hand, a group of retirees – mid-afternoon session obliges – crowds into a quite ordinary cinema in a commercial activity area of Virginia, notes AFP .
Passing in front of the rooms projecting the adventures of Dr Weird and the last sonicthey settle in front of the documentary promising to reveal “widespread and coordinated voter fraud in the 2020 election, sufficient to alter the final result”.
“The Spirit of America”
In opening, and while scrolling images of anonymous enthusiastically slipping their ballots into ballot boxes stamped with the American flag, Dinesh D’Souza assures that “elections are the soul of our democracy. »
But, he says as the decor darkens, that of “2020 haunts the spirit of America. »
Like millions of Americans, including former President Donald Trump, Dinesh D’Souza says he has serious doubts about the possibility that the Democrats rigged the result of the last presidential election, relying on the generalization of postal voting. during the pandemic.
This thesis, repeatedly refuted by the authorities, is still hammered home at each rally of the Republican billionaire – where the trailer for 2000 slippers.
In the documentary, the director assures him: “We can’t move on until we know the truth”.
In an attempt to prove his theory, Dinesh D’Souza stages himself, leaning on a kitchen counter, phoning a Texas-based association that claims to “defend the integrity of elections”. A meeting is arranged.
“a cartel”
In a kind of hangar over-equipped with computer servers, two of the members of the association claim to have proof of the existence of a precise operation which, “like a cartel”, hired “mules” charged to stuff ballot boxes in a string of U.S. states that will win Joe Biden in 2020.
To validate their thesis, they rely on millions of anonymized location data, from location sharing in smart phone applications, supposed to show these “mules” multiplying the comings and goings between the headquarters of different NGOs and ballot boxes. to cast ballots.
It’s “a hold-up”, “a crime”, reacts, outraged, Dinesh D’Souza.
In the room in Virginia, the public is conquered. “It’s like a bomb,” says a man.
The processes advanced in this documentary have been seriously questioned by many experts. A delivery man, taxi driver, or postman working in the neighborhood could very well give the impression of making such comings and goings, they believe.
But for Donald Trump and his supporters, this is the ultimate proof of the fraud they have been denouncing for a year and a half.
“They rigged and stole the 2020 election, we can’t be okay with that, we can’t just move on,” Dinesh D’Souza says as the film closes.
And to launch a call for mobilization, on the first notes of the national anthem: “The America we love needs us, more than ever”.