Earlier this week Sen. Kamala Harris unloaded an evidence-free, borderline outrageous claim. "Let’s say this loud and clear: without voter suppression, Stacey Abrams would be the governor of Georgia; Andrew Gillum is the governor of Florida," the California Democrat told those gathered for the NAACP Freedom Fund dinner in Detroit, adding, "We need to fight back against Republicans who suppress our constitutional right to vote."

Harris, however, is just part of the Democratic chorus. Abrams and Hillary Clinton both still strongly suggest that their respective elections were "stolen" from them.

Meanwhile, on Monday, a delegation of a U.S. House subcommittee that oversees elections, comprised mostly of Democrats, visited Fort Lauderdale as part of a national "listening tour" on matters related to voting, including alleged suppression. According to the Miami Herald, Gillum complained about voter purging and offered one example of this malignant conspiracy to thwart Democrats. It seems Gillum's brother, Marcus, was kicked off the voter roll in Leon County last year after election officials confirmed he lives in Chicago, and was a resident there when he voted in Florida in 2016, using an address of a house Andrew Gillum sold several years ago.

Now some of us might think it's wrong for someone who doesn't live in the state, even a candidate's brother, to vote in a Florida election. And you might think the party that continues to maintain the Russians wrongfully swayed the last presidential election against its candidate might itself insist tougher voting restrictions.

But if you think that way, you're missing the point Democrats seek to plant in voters' minds — to wit, that GOP victories at the polls are unearned and illegitimate, and only due to underhanded techniques.

So, we get from Democrats the perpetual accusation that GOP lawmakers nefariously quash minorities' right to vote by insisting on things like voter identification laws mandating photographs, updated voter records including current signatures and addresses — while objecting to practices like vote "harvesting," automatic or election-day voter registration and enforcing deadlines on counting provisional ballots.

A great risk exists from such behavior. Democrats aren't really highlighting flaws to be addressed. Rather, their assertions purposefully erode the integrity of our election process, and further deepen the demographic fault lines that threaten to divide our nation.

The simple fact is that claims of voter suppression just aren't valid, as demonstrated by recent U.S. Census Bureau data.

In the presidential election years 2008 and 2012, with Barack Obama on the ballot, black voters turned out nationally at the highest rate among all racial groups — topping 90% in both elections. Florida mirrored that in 2008, when 92.1% of black voters cast ballots. That ratio dipped to 87.5% in 2012, slightly below the statewide rate of 89%, but turnout by black voters in Florida still outpaced the national rate among all voters. Turnout among black voters ebbed in 2016 nationally, relative to the previous two presidential contests, to 85.6%. But in Florida, black voters again led in turnout, at 91.5%.

Regarding midterm elections, in 2018, the supposed year of the Great Suppression, black voter turnout nationally was right at 80%, which equaled the rate of white voters and was 17.4 percentage points higher than black turnout in 2014 and 11.7 percentage points above 2010. In Florida, black voters turned out at an 81.5% clip last year, 13.1 percentage points above 2014 and 13.9 percentage points more than in 2010.

By the way turnout among Hispanic and Asian voters in 2018 posted double-digit percentage-point gains over both 2014 and 2010, nationally and in Florida.

Additionally, census statistics show that voter registration among blacks nationally over the last three presidential cycles kept pace with overall black population growth, while in the three midterm elections, registration actually exceeded the increase in population among black Americans.

If Republicans are suppressing minority votes, they're doing a lousy job.

But that's beside the Democrats' point — which is that these laws advocated by Republicans, which are intended to safeguard elections, actually undermine voting for minorities, even though data indicate that's not so.

That story, though, is designed to actually loosen restrictions on voting, which will only invite more chaos and fraud. If we don't pay attention, Democrats will spin this yarn for all it's worth. Just realize that until harder evidence of actual voter suppression emerges, it's only a fairy tale.