“加州正在操纵选举，”极右翼阴谋论账号“TikTok上的自由派”（Libs of Tiktok）于周日宣称。该账号由房地产经纪人转型的挑动者查亚·赖奇克（Chaya Raichik）运营。她给出的证据是：该州选票回邮信封上被打了小孔。赖奇克的这条帖子获得了150万次的浏览量，她分享了一段由某人拍摄的视频，此人声称信封上的孔洞旨在透出里面的投票情况。
“California is rigging the elections,” announced the far-right conspiracist account Libs of Tiktok, run by real estate agent-turned-provocateur Chaya Raichik, on Sunday. Her evidence: small holes punched in the state’s ballot return envelopes. Raichik, whose post was viewed by 1.5 million people, shared a video filmed by someone who claimed the holes in the envelope were designed to reveal the vote within.
类似的说法至少可以追溯到2021年，当时开始流传一些病毒式传播的视频，断言这些孔洞将在当年的州长罢免选举中被用于篡改选票。自那时起，类似赖奇克所散布的虚假信息便让这种观点一直没有消亡。
Similar claims date back to at least 2021, when viral videos began to circulate asserting that the holes would be used for tampering during that year’s gubernatorial recall election. Since then, disinformation like Raichik’s has kept the idea alive.
但孔洞背后的真正原因要简单得多，也绝非什么阴谋：它们的存在是为了让盲人和低视力人群知道在哪里签署信封。在2025年11月的全州特别选举期间，关于选票信封打孔的谣言变得如此普遍，以至于加州州务卿为此发表了一份声明：“我们看到大量关于2025年11月4日全州特别选举选票信封的虚假信息，我想澄清事实，”时任州务卿雪莉·N·韦伯（Shirley N. Weber）当时表示。
But the real reason behind the holes is much simpler and less insidious: they’re there so that blind and low-vision people know where to sign their envelopes. During the statewide special elections of November 2025, rumors about the ballot-envelope perforations became so pervasive that the California Secretary of State issued a statement about it: “We have been seeing a great deal of misinformation about the November 4, 2025, Statewide Special Election ballot envelopes, and I want to set the record straight,” said Secretary of State Shirley N. Weber at the time.
“选票信封上的小孔是一项无障碍功能，可以让视障选民确定他们需要在信封何处签名，”她说道。这些孔洞还有助于选举工作人员确定信封内是否有选票，在试图清点选票时，这是一个重要的考量因素。
“The small holes on ballot envelopes are an accessibility feature to allow sight-impaired voters to orient themselves to where they are required to sign the envelope,” she said. The holes also help election workers determine whether there’s a ballot inside the envelope, an important consideration when you are trying to count ballots.
“信封小孔”理论并非本轮加利福尼亚州选举中唯一流传的阴谋论。联邦机构在未提供证据的情况下指称，可能有数万名非公民在加利福尼亚州投票，这是最新一起指控大规模有利于民主党的选民舞弊团伙存在的毫无根据的说法。唐纳德·特朗普总统也曾在6月声称，进步派民主党人尼蒂亚·拉曼不可能在洛杉矶市长初选中获胜——那些选举定是被操纵了。
The envelope-holes theory isn’t the only conspiracy churning about the California elections this cycle. Federal agencies have alleged without evidence that tens of thousands of noncitizens may be voting in California, the latest unfounded claim of a mass voter fraud ring favoring Democrats. President Donald Trump also claimed in June that progressive Democrat Nithya Raman could not have won her mayoral primary in Los Angeles—and that those elections must have been rigged.
根据加利福尼亚大学伯克利分校研究人员8月的一项研究，所有这些关于普遍存在选举舞弊的说法——无论是与移民有关，还是与信封上的小孔有关——已导致该州75%的共和党人表示，他们对加利福尼亚州的选举系统“不放心”。（与此同时，大多数民主党人担心的是联邦政府和外国政府干预他们的选举，而非内部舞弊。）一些网络评论者指出，如果你信封上的小孔能露出你的选票，那你大概是把选票折错了。
According to an August study by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, all these stories of pervasive election fraud—be it immigration-related or tiny-holes-in-envelopes-related—have led a full 75 percent of the state’s Republicans to say they are “not confident” in California’s election systems. (Most Democrats, meanwhile, are worried about federal and foreign governments intervening in their elections, as opposed to internal fraud.) If the holes in your envelope show your vote, some commenters online pointed out, you’re probably folding your ballot wrong.