Tag: Trump wants to be a dictator

DC braces for pro-Trump protests amid Electoral College challenge

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Officials in Washington, D.C., are bracing for clashes in the streets Wednesday as thousands of pro-Trump supporters arrive to protest the presidential election and cheer on challenges of the Electoral College in Congress.

President Trump in several tweets has called his supporters to gather in the country’s capital for “wild” protests, sparking fears of trouble between proponents and critics of the president.

Three groups have submitted permits to the National Parks Service (NPS) to hold demonstrations Tuesday and Wednesday, calling on Congress to move toward overturning the election in Trump’s favor. The NPS has approved two, granting Women For America First a permit for the “March for Trump” at the Ellipse on Wednesday and the Eighty Percent Coalition a permit for its “Rally for Revival” in Freedom Plaza on Tuesday.  Continue reading.

Trump and his enablers have betrayed our country, and they should be held to account

This thing that’s happening? No one knows what to call it. Despotism? A soft coup? A temper tantrum? Part of the problem is that it is — in the words of former Trumper Chris Christie — “an absurdity.” 

I can be of some use here. Words are my stock and trade.

This is a betrayal of our nation. That’s what we should call it. Continue reading.

‘Sedition’ of Trump-supporting senators has a silver lining: political economist

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I’ve been in or around politics for over a half century now, and I never imagined how low and looney the Republican Party would become. Eleven Republican senators and senators-elect said today they will vote to reject President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory next Wednesday when Congress meets to formally certify it.

They are joining a growing movement in the GOP to defy the unambiguous results of the 2020 presidential election and support Trump’s bizarre attempt to remain in power with false claims of voting fraud.

Remember: Every state has now certified the election results after verifying their accuracy. Several underwent post-election audits or hand counts. At the same time, judges across America, including Supreme Court justices, have rejected nearly 60 attempts by Trump and his allies to challenge the results.

Carl Bernstein Says Latest Trump Tapes Are ‘Far Worse’ Than Watergate

Audio of the president trying to persuade a Georgia official to change election results is “the ultimate smoking gun tape,” the Watergate journalist said.

The leaked tapes of Donald Trump trying to pressure Georgia’s secretary of state to overturn the president’s election defeat are “far worse” than what occurred in the Watergate scandal, journalist Carl Bernstein said Sunday.

Bernstein, whose reporting of the 1972 political scandal led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon, said the bombshell tapes of Trump were evidence of an attempted coup.

“It’s not déjà vu. This was something far worse than occurred in Watergate,” Bernstein told CNN. “We have both a criminal president of the United States in Donald Trump and a subversive president of the United States at the same time in this one person.” Continue reading.

Trump’s pressure on Georgia election officials raises legal questions

In audio from a Saturday phone call, the president is heard urging the officials to reverse his loss.

President Donald Trump’s effort to pressure Georgia officials to “find” enough votes to overturn President-elect Joe Biden’s victory could run afoul of federal and state criminal statutes, according to legal experts and lawmakers, who expressed alarm at Trump’s effort to subvert democracy with less than three weeks left in his term.

“We have won the election in Georgia based on all of this. And there’s nothing wrong with saying that, Brad,” Trump told Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on an hourlong Saturday phone call, according to a recording of the conversation, which also included Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and legal advisers to the president. “And the people of Georgia are angry. The people in the country are angry. And there’s nothing wrong with saying that, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated.”

POLITICO has confirmed the recording, which was first obtained by The Washington Post and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The leaked audio comes as Congress is set to certify the Electoral College votes on Wednesday. At least 12 incoming and current Republican senators, along with well over 100 Republican representatives, have said they are going to challenge the results based on unsupported allegations of voter fraud. Continue reading.

Ex-GOP Speaker Ryan denounces effort to challenge Electoral College results

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Former Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Sunday blasted Congressional Republicans’ efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

“Efforts to reject the votes of the Electoral College and sow doubt about Joe Biden’s victory strike at the foundation of our republic. It is difficult to conceive of a more anti-democratic and anti-conservative act than a federal intervention to overturn the results of state-certified elections and disenfranchise millions of Americans,” Ryan said in a statement.

“The Trump campaign had ample opportunity to challenge election results, and those efforts failed from lack of evidence,” the statement continues. “The legal process was exhausted, and the results were decisively confirmed. The Department of Justice, too, found no basis for overturning the result. If states wish to reform their processes for future elections, that is their prerogative. But Joe Biden’s victory is entirely legitimate.” Continue reading.

Who is on Team Trump Coup?

UPDATED January 7, 2021, to show who actually voted to overthrow the 2020 election.

Here’s a list of individuals elected to Congress, who swore an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution, who are now throwing their word aside to swear fealty to Donald Trump.

  • U.S. Vice President
    • Mike Pence — on January 6, Vice President Pence said he had no power to overturn the votes of the American people during the Electoral College vote certification
  • U.S. Senators
    1. Marsha Blackburn (R, Tennessee) — after Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, decided not to contest
    2. Mike Braun (R, Indiana) — after Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, decided not to contest
    3. Ted Cruz (R, Texas)
    4. Steve Daines (R, Montana) — after Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, decided not to contest
    5. Bill Hagerty (R, Tennessee) — after Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, decided not to contest
    6. Josh Hawley (R, Missouri) — even during the Trump rioters’ storming of the Capitol, Sen. Hawley was fundraising, and when the Senate debate was restarted, he will continue objecting to legally-cast electoral votes.
    7. Cindy Hyde-Smith (R, Mississippi)
    8. Ron Johnson (R, Wisconsin) — after Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, decided not to contest
    9. John Kennedy (R, Louisiana)
    10. James Lankford (R, Oklahoma) — after Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, decided not to contest
    11. Kelly Loeffler (R, Georgia) — after Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, Sen. Loeffler decided not to contest
    12. Cynthia Lummis (R, Wyoming) — after Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, decided not to contest
    13. Roger Marshall (R, Kansas)
    14. Rick Scott (R, Florida)
    15. Tommy Tuberville (R, Alabama)
Continue reading “Who is on Team Trump Coup?”

Fox News host rips ‘outrageous’ GOP Electoral College plot: ‘It’s a very dangerous precedent’

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Fox News host Jedidiah Bila on Sunday criticized Republicans who want to overturn President-elect Joe Biden’s victory by officially objecting to the results of the Electoral College.

“I actually find it really outrageous,” Bila explained to Fox News host Howard Kurtz. “And the reason is that if you look at what’s gone on here, I think the media has actually been pretty fair, particularly the news divisions.”

“This has gone through the courts,” she continued. “Sixty cases have been brought to the courts, oftentimes widespread voter fraud has not even been alleged in court because there simply isn’t evidence to support that. If you look at the evidence that has been shown, it does not support that.” Continue reading.

‘I just want to find 11,780 votes’: In extraordinary hour-long call, Trump pressures Georgia secretary of state to recalculate the vote in his favor

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President Trump urged fellow Republican Brad Raffensperger, the Georgia secretary of state, to “find” enough votes to overturn his defeat in an extraordinary one-hour phone call Saturday that election experts said raised legal questions.

The Washington Post obtained a recording of the conversation in which Trump alternately berated Raffensperger, tried to flatter him, begged him to act and threatened him with vague criminal consequences if the secretary of state refused to pursue his false claims, at one point warning that Raffensperger was taking “a big risk.”

Throughout the call, Raffensperger and his office’s general counsel rejected Trump’s assertions, explaining that the president is relying on debunked conspiracy theories and that President-elect Joe Biden’s 11,779-vote victory in Georgia was fair and accurate. Continue reading.

George Conway only needed 11 words to sum up Pence’s embrace of GOP scheme to overturn the election

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More Republicans embraced the scheme by far-right supporters of Donald Trump to ignore the results of the 2020 election.

Trump lost the Electoral College and popular vote to President-elect Joe Biden, but some Republicans have joined the president in refusing to accept the fact that voter reject the GOP presidential ticket.

On Saturday, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and ten additional GOP senators received harsh criticism after announcing they would go along with the effort to reject the will of the voters. Continue reading.