What’s with Donald Trump telling Republicans that, unless his claims that the election was stolen from him are vindicated, they should refuse to vote?
In an email to his supporters, he said,
“If we don’t solve the Presidential Election Fraud of 2020 (which we have thoroughly and conclusively documented), Republicans will not be voting in ’22 and ’24,”
“It is the single most important thing for Republicans to do.”
Why would Trump say this?
Democrats are inaccurately accusing Republican election reform efforts–designed to address some of Trump’s complaints–as “voter suppression.” But here is an actual case of voter suppression, only Trump is suppressing his own voters!
And how effective is it to make a threat that gives the people you are threatening what they want? “Fix the 2020 elections and inaugurate me, or Republicans won’t vote.” But those who allegedly rigged the elections would love that! That’s no leverage to get them to change anything. This is the equivalent of saying, “If you don’t cancel the vaccine mandate, we’re going to get the vaccines. Plus the booster. Take that!” Or, “Withdraw the $4.5 trillion infrastructure bills, or we’ll vote for them!”
Does this sound like someone who wants to stop the Democrats? Or someone who wants to advance the conservative cause? Or someone who wants to make America great again?
Does this sound like someone who should be the de facto leader of the Republican party?
I suppose the implication is that democracy in America is completely dead, that the Democrats are in such control of the voting apparatus that voting against them is futile. But if that is true, why is Trump hinting that he is going to run in 2024? Won’t the same thing happen again that happened last time? And why endorse all of these candidates if voting doesn’t matter? Trump is supposed to be a fighter, but this sounds like abject surrender.
Trump supporters are torn over this directive, with some flummoxed over it and others saying they will obey. One conservative commentator proposes, mostly tongue-in-cheek, a new conspiracy theory, that Trump is actually a Democrat and his election was a Democratic plot. “It may be insane,” wrote Gerard Baker, “but it would explain why he keeps saving them from self-destruction.”
My sense is that this is another example of Trump’s self-absorption, his tragic flaw that kept him from implementing his best ideas and that made him a one-term president.
Or maybe it was just a “senior moment.” After all, he is 75. That’s just three years younger than the often addled Joe Biden. Should Trump supporters be looking for a candidate who shares Trump’s ideas but who is younger and less inclined to make statements like this?
Or what? Count me among the flummoxed. Help me out here.
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
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