Trump is terrified of the midterms
Chris BrennanDonald Trump, in his second term as president, remains predictable in what he says and does because he has no capacity for growth or change. Trump can only escalate.
A decade in politics has demonstrated this, especially when it comes to the disinformation Trump spews about American elections.
Remember his embarrassment after winning the 2016 presidential election but losing the national popular vote? Trump couldn’t just take the win. He insisted then – and never offered any evidence – that he lost the popular vote because of “millions of people who voted illegally.”
Trump focused that falsehood on voters in California. Get ready for an escalation in that type of attempted deception from him.
The coming wave of evidence-free accusations started on Election Day, hours before polling places even closed, when White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt declared that California elections are full of “blatant fraud.”
A journalist asked Leavitt for evidence. “It’s just a fact,” she tried to counter, with no actual facts.
California voters just approved a measure to counter Trump’s efforts to remake the map of Congressional districts in Texas. California played Trump’s game, looking to beat him at it when control of the U.S. House and Senate is up for grabs in next year’s midterm elections.
That will drive Trump to distraction. He was lobbing distractions just hours after the polls closed on Election Day, amid Democratic victories across the nation that were clearly fueled by a rejection of Trump’s politics and policies.
Trump posted on social media a demand for “voter reform,” including voter ID legislation and an end to mail ballots.
The next morning, while acknowledging in a breakfast meeting with Republican senators that their party just had a very bad election, Trump again blamed a lack of voter ID laws in some states and people who vote with mail ballots.
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Trump’s attacks on the rights of Americans to cast ballots in support of politicians not named Trump will inevitably escalate. His motivation is as clear as it is predictable.
Trump is terrified of the midterms, of Republicans losing control of the House or the Senate or both. Democrats, if they win control of Congress, will stymie Trump’s authoritarian agenda and bring much-needed scrutiny to his actions in office.
The elections this week show the best way to counter Trump’s escalating lies about how we vote: Pay attention. Show up. Cast your ballot. Hold him accountable.
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