Election 2024 live updates: Trump begins transition; three charged in alleged Iranian plot to kill the president-elect

Less than 24 hours after Trump was elected the 47th president of the United States, social media users began pushing two conflicting narratives to suggest election fraud.

One revived false claims by the Republican that the 2020 vote was stolen from him and the other questioned how Vice President Kamala Harris could have received so many fewer votes in 2024 than President Joe Biden in 2020.

Both narratives hinge on a supposed 20 million vote gap between Harris and Biden.

Here’s a closer look at the facts.

Shocking stuff on Fox News’s The Five yesterday, when the following exchange took place between co-hosts Greg Gutfeld and Dana Perino as they basked in the glow of Trump’s win and wondered how the “lawfare” prosecutors who indicted the Republican in 2023 are coping.

“A lot of the people that were on this and wanted it so badly, how are they going to survive? Do you think they need therapy?” Gutfeld asked.

“Yes, they definitely need therapy, and maybe also the death penalty,” Perino responded.

“Yes, I think the death penalty,” the former agreed.

Meanwhile, appearing on Benny Johnson’s online talk show, Mike Davis, reportedly a candidate to be America’s next attorney general, issued the following nasty threat against New York Attorney General Letitia James.

“I dare you to try to continue your lawfare against President Trump in his second term. Because listen here, sweetheart: We’re not messing around this time, and we will put your fat a** in prison for conspiracy against rights, and I promise you that.

“So, think long and hard before you want to violate President Trump‘s constitutional rights, or any other American’s constitutional rights. It’s not going to happen again.”

Here he is during the same interview declaring the mass deportation of illegal immigrants will be “glorious”.

That came a day after Davis said he would like to drag Democrats’ “political dead bodies through the streets and burn them”, another disturbing statement on which Rhian Lubin has more below.

Speaking from the White House Rose Garden yesterday, the president assured Americans there will be a “peaceful and orderly” transition to the new Trump administration.

“Yesterday, I spoke with President-elect Trump to congratulate him on his victory, and I assured him, I will direct my entire administration work with his team to ensure a peaceful and orderly transition,” he said.

Biden also praised Harris, declaring: “She gave her whole heart and effort, and she and her entire team should be proud of the campaign they ran.”

Here’s Andrew Feinberg’s report.

The Republican shared a number of late-night election victory posts on Truth Social on Thursday – his first since his return to power was confirmed early on Wednesday morning.

The wave of posts included an Electoral College map, newspaper front pages recounting his triumph over Democrat Kamala Harris and a photo of a MAGA cap-clad Trump with the caption: “Get ready for the Golden Age.”

Good morning!

President-elect Donald Trump has begun preparing for the Oval Office by naming Susie Wiles as his new White House chief of staff.

Wiles spearheaded his successful 2024 campaign and is the first of many appointees who will help to push his agenda, which includes the mass deportation of illegal immigrants, more trade tariffs and extended tax cuts.

Here’s Alex Hannaford with an introduction to the “Ice Maidan”.

Elon Musk is now unquestionably the king of MAGA media.

Tech journalist Charlie Warzel once named it “the new media Upside Down”, riffing on Stranger Things. Sean Illing at Vox referred to it as “the fantasy-industrial complex”. Wikipedia simply calls it the “right-wing alternative media”.

To Musk, a born-again MAGA crusader who has spent the last two years reshaping one of the world’s major social networks in his image, this parallel universe of algorithm-aided disinformation is simply “citizen journalism” — even if his description does sound a lot like traditional journalism.

And after Donald Trump’s victory this week, the MAGA media universe might just be the new mainstream media.

Io Dodds reports from San Francisco.

Joe Rogan elevated an election integrity conspiracy theory while celebrating Donald Trump’s presidential win, suggesting if the former president had not won the election, it may have been “rigged”.

“So, turns out voting works. It’s real,” Rogan said with delight on Thursday’s episode of The Joe Rogan Experience.

Ariana Baio reports.

Alex Woodward and Bel Trew write:

Two years after the Supreme Court revoked a constitutional right to abortion, millions of voters across the country directly weighed in on the future of reproductive healthcare access in their states.

Voters in seven of 10 states with abortion rights measures on their ballots have agreed to expand protections or enshrine a right to abortion in their own state’s constitutions, effectively redrawing the map for abortion access.

But those victories — from Arizona to Colorado, Missouri, Montana and elsewhere — were followed by warnings from abortion rights advocates that president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming administration, and an emboldened Republican-dominated Congress, could soon upend hard-fought, newly enshrined protections.

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For years, Donald Trump has threatened to go after countless political rivals who he claims have wronged him.

In speeches to supporters and rants on his Truth Social platform, he has on multiple occasions vowed to seek “retribution” and called his political opponents the “enemies from within.”

During an interview with Dr Phil in June, he issued an especially ominous threat. “Well, revenge does take time. I will say that. And sometimes revenge can be justified,” he said.

Here’s Rhian Lubin with a brief rundown of who might make the cut...

Women are facing a barrage of deeply misogynistic comments online following Donald Trump’s US presidential election victory.

The Republican candidate defeated Kamala Harris following a chaotic campaign dogged by anger, insults and division, winning 51 percent of the popular vote on Wednesday, 6 November.

In the wake of the former president’s shocking political comeback, women have reported men are writing “your body, my choice” on their social media posts, among other troubling reproductive rights remarks.

Lydia Spencer-Elliott reports.