We had a system which served the elite well for quite some time now - a general distribution of states and courteous rotation of the Presidency has been combined with an agreement to not disrupt things on the court. It's not like the Repugs were unaware of PO Boxes in Philly that served as the residence for thousands of people, or coerced vote harvesting from group facilities of all types, dead people voting, "voter intent" forging, vote buying, etc, etc. It was simply a gentleman's agreement combined with a threat of mutual destruction. How else do you keep leftist globalists in the senate from Utah and Alaska, etc?
2020 was a special election, because they had to go all in and really jump the shark. That being said, 2016, 2012, 2008, etc - all of them were filled with nod-and-wink fraud.
Problem this time around is that President Trump is not a member of the nod-and-wink club.
Part of my slow red pilling was noticing that the government grew under W, I did kind of write it off due to the terrorism but that was the start of the cracks in the facade for me on the political front. Election night was the final red pill and it's been rabbit holes since.