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Political elites sometimes seek to delegitimize election results using unsubstantiated claims of fraud. Most recently, Donald Trump sought to overturn his loss in the 2020 US presidential election by falsely alleging widespread fraud. Our study provides new evidence demonstrating the corrosive effect of fraud claims like these on trust in the election system. Using a nationwide survey experiment conducted after the 2018 midterm elections – a time when many prominent Republicans also made unsubstantiated fraud claims – we show that exposure to claims of voter fraud reduces confidence in electoral integrity, though not support for democracy itself. The effects are concentrated among Republicans and Trump approvers. Worryingly, corrective messages from mainstream sources do not measurably reduce the damage these accusations inflict. These results suggest that unsubstantiated voter-fraud claims undermine confidence in elections, particularly when the claims are politically congenial, and that their effects cannot easily be mitigated by fact-checking.

Objectives To determine whether older adult spouses’ frailty states and depressive symptoms are interrelated over time. Design Longitudinal, dyadic path analysis with the Actor Partner Interdependence Model. Setting Data were from baseline (1989–1990), wave 3 (1992–1993), and wave 7 (1996–1997), all waves in which frailty and depressive symptoms were measured, of the Cardiovascular Health Study (CHS), a multi-site, longitudinal, observational study of risk factors for cardiovascular disease in adults 65 years or older. Participants Each spouse within 1,260 community-dwelling, married couples. Measurements Frailty was measured using the CHS criteria, categorized as nonfrail, prefrail, or frail. Depressive symptoms were measured using the 10-item Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression scale. Results Within individuals (actor effects), higher frailty status predicted greater subsequent depressive symptoms, and greater depressive symptoms predicted higher subsequent frailty status. Between spouses (partner effects), an individual’s greater frailty status predicted the spouse’s increased frailty status, and an individual’s greater depressive symptoms predicted the spouse’s increased depressive symptoms. Conclusion Frailty and depressive symptoms are interrelated among older adult spouses. For older couples, interventions for preventing or treating frailty and depression that focus on couples may be more effective than those that focus on individuals.

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