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The 12 Republican senators who pledged not to ratify the electoral college results on Wednesday and thus refuse to confirm Joe Biden’s resounding victory over Donald Trump in the presidential election, have refused to defend their decision on television, said Sunday a CNN host.
“It’s all reminiscent of what Ulysses S Grant once wrote in 1861,” Jake Tapper said on camera on his show, State of the Union, before quoting a letter the union general wrote at the start of the week. ‘a civil war that he had won before becoming president himself:’ There is [but] two parties now: the traitors and the patriots.
“How would you describe the holidays today?” Tapper asked.
The attempt to reverse Trump’s defeat appears doomed, essentially a political play put on by party greats eager to woo supporters loyal to the president before, in some cases, mounting their own White House race. .
Nonetheless, on Saturday, Ted Cruz of Texas and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin led a slate of 11 elected senators and senators calling for “a 10-day emergency audit” of results in states in which the president continues to claim fraud mass electoral campaign, despite its failure. to provide evidence and repeatedly lose in court.
Senators followed Josh Hawley of Missouri – as Cruz believed likely to run for president in 2024 – by pledging to oppose the Electoral College result. A majority of Republicans in the House are also expected to oppose, after arranging a rare Saturday night appeal with Trump and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to plan their move.
Democrats control the House, and senior Senate Republicans also oppose the attempt to deprive millions of voters – many of whom are African Americans in major swing states – thus apparently ensuring that attempt will fail. Nonetheless, on Saturday Vice President Mike Pence, who will chair the ratification process, praised the move by the group led by Cruz.
A spokesperson for Biden, Michael Gwin, said: “This stunt will not change the fact that President-elect Biden is sworn in on January 20, and these baseless claims have already been considered and rejected by Trump’s own attorney general. , dozens of courts and election officials from both parties. “
Republicans opposed to Trump have been outspoken. Mitt Romney, the 2012 presidential candidate now a senator from Utah, said, “The blatant voter rejection ploy may bolster the political ambition of some, but dangerously threatens our democratic republic.
“… More Americans participated in this election than ever before, and they made their choice. President Trump’s lawyers have made their case in numerous courts; in all cases, they failed. The Justice Department found no evidence of impropriety sufficient to overturn the election. The Presidential Commission on Election Fraud was dissolved without finding such evidence.
“In addition to this ill-conceived effort by some in Congress, there is the President’s call for his supporters to come to Capitol Hill on the day this issue is debated and decided. This has the predictable potential to lead to disruption, if not worse. “
Encouraged by Trump, far-right groups, including the “Western chauvinists” Proud Boys, are expected to meet in Washington on Wednesday.
Romney was taken over by Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, a battlefield state. Hawley responded with a statement which decried “Shameless personal attacks”.
Georgia, another state in which Trump refuses to accept defeat, goes to the polls in the second round of the Senate on Tuesday.
Stacey Abrams, a former candidate for governor in Georgia who now promotes the right to vote, told ABC this week: “It is always dangerous to undermine the integrity of elections without proof.
Abrams lost his gubernatorial race in 2018 to Brian Kemp, the Republican candidate who also led the election as secretary of state. Alleging irregularities, Abrams refused to concede. Asked about Republican accusations that Trump’s objection to the presidential outcome is no different, she said, “Well, it’s not just different circumstances. They’re apples and bowling balls.
“I pointed out that there were a series of measures taken that hampered the ability of voters to vote. And in almost all of these circumstances, the courts have agreed, as has the state legislature.
In contrast, she added, “President Trump has lost every challenge in the state of Georgia and he has no proof.”
Shortly before the start of the year, after Hawley announced his move, Ben Sasse of Nebraska – another senator believed to harbor presidential ambitions – issued a scathing rebuke, saying: “Adults don’t point a gun. charged to the core of the legitimate self. government.”
“We have a deep cancer in American politics,” he added. “Republicans and Democrats are increasingly suspicious of the basic processes and procedures that we follow.”
Senators who came forward for Trump on Saturday made the same argument, pointing to public polls. Johnson told NBC on Sunday they were acting “to protect” the democratic process.
Such arguments are in bad faith – the blame for such mistrust is by far the heaviest on the White House and its Republican allies. At Johnson’s insistence that “tens of millions” of Americans believe the presidential election was “stolen” from Trump, NBC Meet the Press host Chuck Todd suggested that the senator “look in the mirror ”if he wanted to understand why.
Todd then interrupted the senator by saying, “You can’t make these claims that haven’t been proven.”
On CNN, Tapper played Hawley’s remarks from January, when Trump was impeached.
“The consequences for the republic of canceling an election because you don’t like the result,” he said at the time, “and because you think this election was somehow corrupted then that in fact, the evidence shows that it wasn’t … it’s an interesting approach. I think it’s crazy, frankly.
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