We should begin any consideration of President Trump’s claims that the 2020 election was riddled with fraud with the context that Trump has been making similar claims without evidence for five years and, for months, has telegraphed his intention to claim that any loss in this year’s contest was a function of dishonesty. He is the president who has repeatedly cried wolf — but who also said for months that he was going to cry wolf. And now he is saying there’s a wolf.
The rationale for doing this is obvious. It’s becoming increasingly clear that Trump lost the election, by about the same electoral-vote margin he won four years ago but with a much greater loss of popular vote. If his goal is to stay in office at any cost, he has got to do something to undercut the results. So this is his play, as he said it would be.
His allies and enablers, predictably, are lining up to support him. Instead of demonstrating fraud, though, they’re simply alleging it and using those allegations as their case. Former ambassador Ric Grenell, for example, was asked by MSNBC on Thursday for evidence of his claims about fraud in Nevada, and he insisted that the reporters ask Nevada officials, as though simply because he said something the media was supposed to consider it believable by default. That’s not how such things work. If I say that you are a space alien, it’s not sufficient for me to demand that any skeptics bother you to answer questions about it. Also, Michigan has been called for Biden. Continue reading.