Election Crimes Bulletin: “Its a Soft Coup”

In this edition of the Election Crimes Bulletin, first broadcast on Nov 6, 2025, investigative journalist Greg Palast and Flashpoints host Dennis J. Bernstein unpack the results from Tuesday’s election.

Zohran Mamdani won the New York City mayoral election by 181,000 votes. The early vote in New York was a record-breaking 735,000. That's where Mamdani’s margin came in.

When you let people vote, they vote progressive. That’s why Trump has gone after mail-in voting and early voting, because that is how minorities vote these days.

In a democracy, the voters are supposed to pick the politicians. But now we have politicians picking the voters. Around 22 states have made it more difficult to vote by mail or use dropboxes.

They cut the number of voting stations and dropboxes in low income, student and minority areas to engineer long lines, while the people in the white suburbs have zero wait to vote.

These states are also “caging” voters, using the euphemism “voter-roll hygiene” to remove mostly poor, young, and minority voters from the rolls.

Onerous ID laws, heavy restrictions on early and mail-in voting, gerrymandering, laws that allow mass challenges — it's a soft coup. It's not troops in the street grabbing ballot boxes. It's seizing control of the procedure to make it impossible or difficult for people of color, students, and low income voters to vote.

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