Republicans in North Carolina tried to steal an election through massive election fraud, and Trump's response was a conspiracy theory-laden rant full of lies.
Asked to respond to the devastating GOP election fraud in North Carolina, Trump launched into a litany of bogus stories, none of which have any evidence to back up Trump's outlandish claims.
He accused California and Texas of voter fraud. He said one million fraudulent votes had recently been discovered, though he didn't say where, and there are certainly no reports anywhere in the news of such a thing.
He complained about the vote recount in last year's Florida elections. And, after more than a minute of angry ranting, he insisted that he wanted to see a "final report" on North Carolina — despite the unanimous vote by the North Carolina election board calling for the first congressional election do-over in 44 years due to the overwhelming evidence of election fraud.
"I condemn any election fraud," Trump said, starting his answer on solid ground. But then things went off the rails.
When I look at what's happened in California, with the votes, when I look at what happened — as you know, there was just a case where they found a million fraudulent votes, when I look at what's happened in Texas — excuse me, excuse me — when I look at what's happened in Texas, when I look at that catastrophe that took place in Florida, where the Republican candidates kept getting less and less and less and less, and fortunately Rick Scott and Ron ended up winning their election, but it was disgraceful what happened there.
So I look at a lot of different places all over the country. I condemn any voter fraud of any kind, whether it's Democrat or Republican. But when you look at some of the things that happened in California, in particular, when you look at what's happened in Texas, where some of those votes that they recently found were not exactly properly done — I condemn all of it. And that includes North Carolina, if anything, you know — I guess they're going to be doing a final report, but I'd like to see the final report. But any form of election fraud, I condemn.
On the subject of North Carolina, the original question, evidence of election fraud is so damning that even the Republican candidate, Mark Harris, admitted a new election was necessary.
After the board made its ruling, North Carolina Democratic Party Chairman Wayne Goodwin issued a statement saying, "This saga could only have ended in a new election, and we look forward to repairing the harm dealt by Republicans and giving the people of the Ninth district the representative they deserve."
As for the other states Trump weighed in on, there is a thin veneer of reality surrounding a litany of unhinged conspiracy theories. For example, an election did, in fact, happen in California in November 2018. But there is no evidence of voter fraud or election fraud whatsoever.
There is ample evidence, however, that Republican candidates up and down the ballot suffered devastating losses. Democrats won all statewide offices, super-majorities in both state chambers of the legislature, and ousted seven Republicans from the House of Representatives.
Trump may want to lie to himself to sooth his bruised ego after such an undeniable rejection of him and his policies, but his baseless accusations about fraud don't match what really happened.
The same is true for Florida. Trump was not the only Republican outraged at the idea that every voter had the right to have their ballot counted. After all the ballots were counted, Republicans narrowly won the races for senator and governor, but Trump's allegations of fraud are completely baseless.
In Texas, state officials made headlines by making wild accusations of possible widespread voter registration fraud. But days after the alarming allegations, officials were already walking back their claims, admitting they exaggerated the extent of their claims. The state is now facing multiple lawsuits.
Trump frequently tells tall tales of supposed "voter fraud" to try to explain Republican losses. But when it comes to a very real case of a Republican campaign committing fraud to steal a congressional seat, Trump shrugs it off, claims he needs further evidence before rushing to judgment, and resorts to outrageous lies about fraud that doesn't exist.
Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.
