距离中期选举仅剩数周之际，否认选举结果的组织找到了一个新目标：养老院。
With just weeks to go until the midterms, election denial groups have found a new target: nursing homes.
在右翼组织“选举诚信网络”的领导下，这些团体在没有证据的情况下声称，左翼组织正在养老院、护理之家和辅助生活设施内部实施选票欺诈。该网络目前正在招募其追随者去联系并质问这些设施。
The groups, led by the right-wing Election Integrity Network, have claimed without evidence that left-wing organizations are perpetrating voter fraud inside nursing homes, care homes, and assisted-living facilities. The network is now recruiting their followers to contact and question those facilities.
“选举诚信网络”创始人克莱塔·米切尔最近在斯蒂芬·班农的《战争房间》节目中露面时说：“这些左翼组织进入养老院，进入集体住宅，他们基本上偷走了这些最弱势群体的选票。”
“These left-wing groups go into the nursing homes, and they go into the group homes, and they basically steal the votes of these most vulnerable,” Cleta Mitchell, the Election Integrity Network’s founder, said in a recent appearance on Steve Bannon’s War Room show.
作为证据，米切尔提到了2020年威斯康星州的一个案件，当时一名警长指控护理之家的八名居民被人代填了选票。威斯康星州选举委员会驳回了这些说法。米切尔对班农说，这起案件可能导致总统唐纳德·特朗普输掉了2020年选举，尽管这并不可能：特朗普在2020年威斯康星州选举中以超过2万票的劣势落败。
As evidence, Mitchell referenced a case in Wisconsin from 2020 in which a sheriff alleged that eight residents in a care home had their votes filled out for them. The Wisconsin Election Commission rejected the claims. Mitchell told Bannon the case could have cost president Donald Trump the 2020 election, though that wouldn’t be possible: Trump lost Wisconsin in 2020 by over 20,000 votes.
米切尔的组织一直在敦促追随者从“选举诚信网络”网站下载工具包，并给他们所在地区的养老院发邮件和打电话。该组织还制作了多张供追随者在社交媒体上分享的图片，这些图片强化了养老院存在广泛选票欺诈的想法。
Mitchell’s group has been urging followers to download a toolkit from the Election Integrity Network website and email and call nursing homes in their area. The group has also created multiple images for followers to share on social media which reinforce the idea of widespread voter fraud at nursing homes.
在一场活动中，该网络分享了一系列帖子，绘制了包括亚利桑那州、加利福尼亚州、新罕布什尔州、宾夕法尼亚州和弗吉尼亚州在内的竞争激烈的国会选区中的住宅护理设施地图。这些帖子识别出了“可能成为寻求轻松获取选票的政治掠夺者目标的‘弱势居民’”。米切尔和“选举诚信网络”未回应置评请求。
In one campaign, the network shared a series of posts that mapped residential care facilities in competitive congressional districts in states including Arizona, California, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. The posts identified “vulnerable residents” who “may become targets for political predators seeking easy access to ballots.”Mitchell and the Election Integrity Network did not respond to requests for comment.
这项努力是否认选举结果的人士破坏中期选举信任的更广泛行动的一部分。正如关于非公民投票和广泛邮寄选票欺诈的主张一样，它们受到了特朗普政府的强力推动。
The effort is part of a much broader push by election deniers to undermine trust in the midterms. And just like the claims of noncitizen voting and widespread mail-in voter fraud, they have been supercharged by the Trump administration.
7月，医疗保险和医疗补助服务中心发布了一份备忘录，删除了先前关于养老院工作人员如何帮助居民投票的指导意见，例如协助进行邮寄投票或用车送居民去投票站。新备忘录用起诉威胁取代了这些指导意见，称如果工作人员“参与不当胁迫或侵犯居民权利的其他违规行为”。该备忘录还声称，该机构“已经获悉几起居民权利被非法侵犯的指控实例”。然而，备忘录中引用的例子并未导致任何已被证实的选票欺诈案件。医疗保险和医疗补助服务中心未回应置评请求。
In July, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) issued a memo that removed previous guidance on how staff at nursing homes could help residents to vote, such as assisting with mail-in voting or transporting residents to polling locations. The new memo replaced that guidance with threats of prosecution if staff “engage in inappropriate coercion or other violations of residents’ rights.”The memo also claimed that the agency has “become aware of several allegations of instances in which resident rights were unlawfully violated.”However, the examples cited in the memo did not lead to any proven cases of voter fraud. CMS did not respond to a request for comment.
8月，由伊丽莎白·沃伦和亚历克斯·帕迪利亚领导的参议员猛烈抨击了这些修改，他们在致医疗保险和医疗补助服务中心的一封信中写道，新规定不仅没有保护该国的200万养老院居民，反而会剥夺他们的投票权。
In August, senators led by Elizabeth Warren and Alex Padilla slammed the changes, writing in a letter to CMS that rather than protecting the country’s 2 million nursing home residents, the new rules would disenfranchise them.
参议员们在写给医疗保险和医疗补助服务中心管理员穆罕默德·奥兹（他本人对于2020年选举是否被操纵态度反复无常）的信中写道：“医疗保险和医疗补助服务中心发布了一份备忘录，这似乎是试图恐吓养老院工作人员，使其不敢协助居民参与投票过程。”
“CMS issued a memo that appears to be an attempt to intimidate nursing home staff from assisting residents in the voting process,” the senators wrote in the letter, addressed to CMS administrator Mehmet Oz (who himself has flip-flopped on whether the 2020 election was rigged).
但现在，距离中期选举不到一个月，像“选举诚信网络”这样与白宫关系密切的组织正在推波助澜，散布养老院是操纵选票活动温床的叙事。
But now, with less than a month to go before the midterms, groups like the Election Integrity Network—which has close ties to the White House—are pushing the narrative that nursing homes are a hive of vote rigging activity.
*另一个否认选举结果的组织、总部位于纽约的“公民计划”发起了一项名为“认领护理机构”的类似活动。该组织告诉《连线》杂志，它无法分享有多少人参与了该活动，但除了其他指控外，它还重复了医疗保险和医疗补助服务中心关于威斯康星州选票欺诈的说法。
Another election denial group, the New York–based Project Civicia, has launched a similar campaign, entitled “Adopt a Care Facility.”The group told WIRED that it could not share how many people were taking part in the campaign but repeated the claims made by CMS about voter fraud in Wisconsin, in addition to other allegations.
“公民计划”联合创始人兼总裁金·埃尔芒斯告诉《连线》杂志：“我们不会因为某个设施的居民需要投票协助就假定其存在违规行为。还有其他关于伪造缺席选票申请及类似问题的公开案例。另外，在我们对纽约记录的自行审查中，我们注意到一些85岁以上的人在选举前不久似乎第一次去投票。这本身并不违法，但它引发了一个关于设施如何处理这一过程的基本问题。”
“We do not presume wrongdoing by a facility because its residents need voting assistance,” Kim Hermance, cofounder and president of Project Civica, tells WIRED. “There are other public cases of forged absentee applications and similar problems. Separately, in our own review of New York records, we noticed people over 85 who appeared to and vote for the first time shortly before an election. That is not illegal by itself, but it raised a basic question about how facilities handle the process.”