Typically, I wouldn’t waste time on a stupid Trumpublican conspiracy theory that’s floating around, but the latest #Suitcasegate trending on Twitter is so ridiculous because it simply defies physics.  But then, science isn’t a strong suit for Trumpublican.

Here’s the conspiracy theory in a nutshell:  between 11 p.m. and 12:45 a.m. on Election Night, two Atlanta Democrat [sic] operatives brought two (or in some stories, four) suitcases filled with 185,420 ballots, all for Biden, to the State Farm Arena in Atlanta, where they were counted and where they threw the election to President-elect Joe Biden.

It’s a very precise number–185,420–taken from the reporting of vote tally dumps.  “It’s impossible,” they claim, “that that many votes were tallied in that period of time.”  Believers even can show you photos of a man and a woman wheeling in the ballots in the two (or four) suitcases.  Others will point out that the number of votes reported were *impossible* because of *time*–without understanding that data dumps consolidate data over time.

https://twitter.com/zenxv/status/1334770646291779584

But here’s the most idiotic part of the conspiracy theory, evident to anyone who has ever carried a case of paper from a Staples or Office Depot store:  they’re *really heavy*.

A ten-ream carton of standard copy paper, which holds 5,000 blank sheets of standard 8½” x 11″ paper, weighs about 50 pounds, so we have to believe that these two people were lugging about nearly ONE TON (1,845 pounds) of paper in two (or four) suitcases.  Being generous, if they had them in four suitcases, that’s 460 pounds per suitcase–which would’ve likely cost an arm and a leg in excess weight charges at any airline.

For the record, an NFL player in tip-top shape would be at the top of the league if he were able to routinely benchpress 500 pounds.  It’s a lot of weight, but we’re supposed to believe that these two seemingly-middle-aged people were rolling and tossing around two (or four) suitcases weighing 450+ pounds.

Now, let’s go to volume:  a carton of ten reams of paper has a dimension of 17.88 x 11.63 x 10.25 inches.  Granted that’s with a cardboard box, so let’s make that a more manageable 17″ x 11″ x 10″, or 1,870 cubic inches, roughly 1.1 cubic feet–about the same as 30 liters of liquid.

The number of ballots they cite–185,420–would be roughly 37 cubic feet of volume–WAY too much for two (or four) suitcases, no matter how advanced your packing skills.  For comparison, a rather standard refrigerator found in most homes has 22.8 cubic feet of storage space.

Now, these calculations do not take into consideration other variables, like the fact that ballots tend to be of a larger size than 8½” x 11″ paper and that with that number of sheets, the weight of ink is not negligible.

We know that Trumpublicans don’t believe in science or math, but this latest claim is simply immeasurably absurd.