Trump’s Election Conspiracy Insanity Haunts Republicans

Democrats learn how to make Republicans own the craziness.

Donald Trump’s unhinged tirade Thursday night consisted of baseless claims that our elections are insecure, wild accusations about China (not Russia!) interfering with our elections for which not even his own minions could vouch, and another desperate pitch for the SAVE Act. The New York Times reported, “John Solomon, who is leading Mr. Trump’s task force on declassifying documents on a range of issues, told reporters outside the White House that the intelligence community documents show no evidence that votes in election machines were changed in the past three elections.”

As election guru Rick Hasen put it, “Overall, this was an underwhelming announcement delivered with low energy that changes nothing about how state and local election administrators should run elections.” Hasen reiterated that Trump did not “even purport to show a single ineligible voter voted in the 2020 election, or that any voting machines were actually compromised, voting machines or voter registration databases breached, or election results inaccurately reported.” Unsurprisingly, documents he promised would verify his accusations did no such thing, either.

NBC and ABC’s refusal to air the screed live on national broadcast naturally threw Trump into a rage, compelling him to threaten to pull their licenses in true tin-pot dictator style. Overall, the legacy media’s intense skepticism and willingness to call out Trump’s unsubstantiated claims showed some refreshing spine. Republicans were strangely quiet, apparently hoping that by hiding from their lunatic in chief, they would shed culpability for his attacks on democracy. Good luck with that.

Sen. Ossoff persisted in questioning Jay Clayton about the winner of the 2020 election.

Democrats would be wise to follow Georgia Democrat Sen. Jon Ossoff’s approach to Trump’s election denial crackpottery. Ossoff treated Trump’s assault on the election system as proof positive that the president is nuts and that his Republican enablers cannot be trusted to defend democracy.

In advance of Thursday’s rant, Ossoff leapt into action on Monday, deftly declining to take Trump’s election lunacy bait seriously but also refusing to ignore the danger of a president obsessed with election interference and disruption.

“Donald Trump’s spiral continues. The failed president, pocketing billions as he drives up prices, is afraid to lose the midterms,” Ossoff posted. “So he will reheat debunked election conspiracy theories and tell bizarre new lies to deny his 2020 defeat and attack voting rights.” He also slammed his opponent, Trump puppet and Georgia Republican Senate nominee Mike Collins, who has proved willing to “double down on conspiracy theories toxic in the General Election.”

Ossoff slammed Trump again on Thursday, correctly predicting the speech would be “equal parts pathetic and dangerous.” He labeled Trump as “the world’s most famous sore loser” and his speech “a prime time presidential sour grapes address reheating debunked conspiracy theories about an election in which he was soundly defeated.” Well, he got that right.

“Privately, most elected Republicans in this building think the president has lost it and is dooming them to dismal losses this fall,” Ossoff told reporters. “They view him as somebody who’s adverse to their own interests. They know that he’s torpedoing GOP chances in these midterm elections.” Reporting on Republicans’ reaction to Trump’s primetime asininity confirmed Ossoff’s take.

During the week, Ossoff showed how to drive home his message during Jay Clayton's confirmation hearing for Director of National Intelligence. In refusing to let go when Clayton refused to definitively say who won the 2020 election, Ossoff managed to humiliate Clayton. “You refuse to answer a basic question about who won a presidential election, but you ask to lead America’s intelligence community,” Ossoff said. “Isn’t it humiliating to be unable to answer this question, to have to indulge the president’s delusions?”

Ossoff accomplishes several important objectives in exposing Trump’s insane obsession with election conspiracy mongering. Democrats should take note.

First, he puts Trump’s rants in the proper context; these are not serious claims about foreign interference or election vulnerability — but rather evidence of his mental deterioration and political desperation.

Second, Ossoff properly casts Republicans as cowards incapable of standing up to a deranged president (and hence incapable of upholding their constitutional oaths). As Ossoff said Thursday, “It’s Donald Trump who tried to defraud Georgia voters in that election.” His opponent, Mike Collins, agrees with Trump. So Georgia voters know exactly what he thinks of them. In debates, ads, and appearances, Democrats must make Republicans own the insanity. Ossoff managed to demolish executive branch suck-ups like Clayton, Todd Blanche, etc., pre-bunking their wild allegations of election fraud and revealing them as timorous little men.

As maddening as it may be, Democrats cannot stop a pathological lying president from spinning election conspiracies out of thin air, nor will they successfully shame a significant number of elected Republicans into standing up for democracy. Following Ossoff’s lead, however, they can ensure that Trump’s effort to bollix up the elections fails.

Whatever election chicanery Trump says he wants the federal government to conduct, whatever “emergency” he concocts, Democrats should stress that this blather does not change facts, largely because courts consistently have rebuked and halted Trump’s repeated power grabs that violate our constitutional structure.

Trump’s has racked up an impressive record of failure/defeat in court regarding 15 attempts to seize states’ unredacted voter files; a bogus effort to create a national voting roll (to be used to discredit state voting rights that do not adhere to the fraudulent list); an unprecedented attempt to enlist the U.S. Post Office to block mail in ballots; and a mish-mash of court-reputiated “provisions that would have forced new proof of citizenship requirements onto federal voter registration forms, restricted military and overseas voters and pressured states to reject ballots that are postmarked by Election Day but arrive after.” Reminding voters that Trump’s wild claims and executive dictates do not change the election’s actual operation is critical for maintaining confidence in the election and defending the results.

Finally, Democrats should remind voters what this is all about: Trump’s desperation to cling to power. “As unending corruption, a failed Middle Eastern war, and a crumbling economy continue to erode political support for the president’s partisan allies, he has ramped up efforts to manipulate the election to cling to power and evade democratic accountability,” concluded the nonpartisan Protect Democracy’s recent report on Trump’s effort “to weaponize the full power of the federal government against our elections.”

If Trump could run on the economy, foreign policy success, a winning immigration strategy, lowering prices, or expanding access to affordable healthcare, childcare, or housing — he would. But he has failed at every turn (in some cases, such as housing, turning hostile to bipartisan problem-solving).

Democrats must ensure voters grasp that election denial, disinformation, and deception are the last-gasp tactics of a failing regime with no other way to retain power.

While Trump’s authoritarian power grabs are becoming more intense, Trump remains his party’s worst enemy. Democrats such as Ossoff — together with courts, responsible media outlets, local and state officials, and patriotic voters can thwart Trump’s frantic, insane scramble to avoid the inevitable: namely, the decisive defeat of his incompetent, corrupt, and anti-democratic cult of personality.