President Donald Trump tweeted out a Los Angeles-based video of ballots being collected from a drop box the day after Election Day, which the L.A. County Registrar confirmed was normal protocol.

Trump posted the video on Wednesday, saying, “You are looking at BALLOTS! Is this what our country has come to?”

Before Trump’s tweet, which received more than 6 million views, the video had been posted and shared through social media days after the election. It was shot on a personal phone and the person filming can be heard questioning why ballots were being picked up after election day, and how the state of California could be “called” when ballots were not yet received.

“I thought they collected them all,” the person filming said. “I just want to see, ’cause they called our state so quickly.”

The L.A. County Registrar said that all 405 ballot drop-off locations were locked at 8 p.m. on November 3 and scheduled for pickup the day after.

“Trump falsely claims fraud in L.A. elections. The truth is there were few problems,” the L.A. County Registrar tweeted from its official twitter account.

As the video circulated before Trump’s tweet, the registrar said on November 5, “These are valid ballots that will be processed and counted during the post-election canvass — like all outstanding vote by mail ballots.”

The registrar also announced that Los Angeles County surpassed 4 million total ballots cast, as of November 9, making it the highest voter count in the county’s history. The previous high came in the 2016 Presidential Elections with 3.54 million ballots cast.

California is the latest state the president has accused of fraud, as he continues attempts to contest the election and challenge the effectiveness of mail-in balloting.

He has cited widely-shared social media videos in his past fraud accusations, most notably from Pennsylvania where ballot counters were allegedly boarding up windows from inside, reducing visibility from onlookers.

Since the race was called in favor of projected President-elect Joe Biden, President Trump has not conceded, has filed multiple lawsuits against states and a hand recount has been announced in Georgia, which Biden had won by less than 14,000 votes.

 

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