Last updated on July 17th, 2023 at 09:20 pm
Republicans are finally realizing that letting Donald Trump undermine the credibility of the nation’s electoral process is not a good idea.
“Somebody claiming in the election, ‘I was defrauded,’ that isn’t going to cut it,†said former Sen. Kit Bond, a Missouri Republican who earlier in the campaign endorsed Jeb Bush and then Marco Rubio. “They’re going to have to say how, where, why, when.â€
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“I don’t think leading candidates for the presidency should undercut the process unless you have a really good reason,†Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican who gained little support for his own 2016 White House run, told POLITICO.
A few Republicans are beginning to understand that if they allow Trump to destroy their party’s faith in the integrity of US elections, it will be a problem, not only after the 2016 election but also in future elections.
Donald Trump thinks that anything that he is not winning is rigged, so Republicans should have seen this behavior coming miles away. What is troubling is that more Republicans aren’t standing up to defend the backbone of the US democratic process.
If Donald Trump loses, it won’t be because the election was rigged. There are literally hundreds of more credible reasons for Trump’s potential defeat than a rigged election. At its current pace, the 2016 presidential election looks like it may not be close.
The 2000 presidential election did immeasurable damage by raising doubts about the integrity of the process. Donald Trump is trying to exploit those doubts to soothe his own ego.
Republicans are reaping what they have sown, as the doubts Trump is creating could ripple among GOP voters for years to come.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
