Many in the media and on the left have been trying to make a big deal out whether President Trump would accept the results if he lost and if he would leave the White House.
House Judiciary Ranking Member Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) eviscerated the idea this morning in a tweet by listing out examples of Democrats contesting this election and the last and asked, “But President Trump is the threat?”
“Give me a break,” he concluded.
Democrats still haven’t accepted the 2016 election results.
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan) September 24, 2020
They’re threatening to riot when Joe Biden loses.
AND Hillary Clinton said Biden shouldn’t concede under any circumstances.
But President Trump is the threat? Give me a break.
Jordan first referenced the previous presidential election and the continued narrative that because Russia interfered, it was illegitimate, saying, “Democrats still haven’t accepted the 2016 election results.”
Appearing to reference a New York Post Op-ed by Jonathan S. Tobin, Jordan continued, “They’re threatening to riot when Joe Biden loses.” In that Op-ed, Tobin wrote, “It’s a Democratic Party that is fully prepared to unleash ruin on the nation if it loses again.”
Jordan then brought up a clip released in August from an interview that Hillary Clinton did for a show The Circus on Showtime and said that “Hillary Clinton said Biden shouldn’t concede under any circumstances.”
In the clip, the 2016 Democratic Presidential nominee, Clinton said that “Biden should not concede under any circumstances, because I think this is going to drag out, and eventually I do believe he will win if we don’t give an inch, and if we are as focused and relentless as the other side is.”
Trump was asked yesterday at a news conference a question whether he’d commit to a peaceful transfer of power and he responded by saying, “We’re going to have to see what happens. You know that I’ve been complaining very strongly about the ballots, and the ballots are a disaster.”
From the AP:
It is highly unusual that a sitting president would express less than complete confidence in the American democracy’s electoral process. But he also declined four years ago to commit to honoring the election results if his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton, won.
His current Democratic challenger, Joe Biden, was asked about Trump’s comment after landing in Wilmington, Delaware, on Wednesday night.
“What country are we in?” Biden asked incredulously, adding: “I’m being facetious. Look, he says the most irrational things. I don’t know what to say about it. But it doesn’t surprise me.”
Trump has been pressing a monthslong campaign against mail-in voting this November by tweeting and speaking out critically about the practice. More states are encouraging mail-in voting to keep voters safe amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The president, who uses mail-in voting himself, has tried to distinguish between states that automatically send mail ballots to all registered voters and those, like Florida, that send them only to voters who request a mail ballot.
Trump has baselessly claimed widespread mail voting will lead to massive fraud. The five states that routinely send mail ballots to all voters have seen no significant fraud.
Trump on Wednesday appeared to suggest that if states got “rid of” the unsolicited mailing of ballots there would be no concern about fraud or peaceful transfers of power.
“You’ll have a very peaceful — there won’t be a transfer frankly,” Trump said. “There’ll be a continuation. The ballots are out of control, you know it, and you know, who knows it better than anybody else? The Democrats know it better than anybody else.”
In a July interview, Trump similarly refused to commit to accepting the results.
“I have to see. Look … I have to see,” Trump told Chris Wallace during a wide-ranging July interview on “Fox News Sunday.” “No, I’m not going to just say yes. I’m not going to say no, and I didn’t last time either.”
The Biden campaign responded Wednesday: “The American people will decide this election. And the United States government is perfectly capable of escorting trespassers out of the White House.”
The American Civil Liberties Union also protested Trump’s remarks. “The peaceful transfer of power is essential to a functioning democracy,” National Legal Director David Cole said. “This statement from the president of the United States should trouble every American.”
Trump made similar comments ahead of the 2016 election. When asked during an October debate whether he would abide by the voters’ will, Trump responded that he would “keep you in suspense.”
It’s unlikely that any chaos in states with universal mail-in voting will cause the election result to be inaccurately tabulated, as Trump has suggested.
The five states that already have such balloting have had time to ramp up their systems, while four states newly adopting it — California, New Jersey, Nevada and Vermont — have not. Washington, D.C., is also newly adopting it.
Of those nine states, only Nevada is a battleground, worth six electoral votes and likely to be pivotal only in a national presidential deadlock.
California, New Jersey, Vermont and D.C. are overwhelmingly Democratic and likely to be won by Biden.
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