From calls for his Republican party to “nationalise” voting to his repeated false claims of a stolen election, President Donald Trump is ramping up attacks on the electoral system ahead of this year’s US midterms.
The latest idea from Trump — who still refuses to acknowledge his 2020 election defeat by Democrat Joe Biden — is to take responsibility for organizing elections away from some US states and hand it to the federal government instead.
“The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over. We should take over the voting in at least — many, 15 places.’ The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting,” Trump told podcaster and former FBI deputy director Dan Bongino this week.
His extraordinary comments — which were condemned by Democrats — come as Republicans face losing control of Congress in the November 3 midterm elections. Polls show low approval ratings for second-term president Trump while Republicans have suffered a string of losses in local elections.
Trump has, however, doubled down on his long-standing but debunked claims of widespread voter fraud — and his insistence that he needs to tackle it.
“I don’t know why the federal government doesn’t do them anyway,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday when asked about his comments about nationalizing elections.
Trump pressed the case in an interview with NBC News that aired Wednesday, alleging “there are some areas in our country that are extremely corrupt.”
He added that if elections “can’t be done properly and timely, then something else has to happen.”
AFP
