A core question regarding former President Donald Trump’s extensive attempts to overturn the 2020 election was whether he actually believed the election-fraud lies he was peddling, or if he understood all along that he had legitimately lost, and he was merely using those lies to attempt to remain in office. A newly revealed email, in which a top Trump campaign official specifically directed fake Trump electors in Georgia to hide their scheme, indicates it was the latter.
The Capitol mob’s attempt to prevent Joe Biden’s confirmation as the elected new president on Jan. 6, 2021, was only the most obvious and violent manifestation of a multipronged effort by Trump’s campaign to retain power. Part of that effort involved dozens of court filings alleging mass voter fraud, all of which failed.
The campaign, and Trump personally, also worked key state election officials behind the scenes. “I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have” in losing Georgia, Trump infamously (and fruitlessly) told Georgia’s Republican secretary of state. That request came pretty close to smoking-gun proof that Trump wasn’t innocently delusional about the election outcome, but that he knew he’d lost and was trying to skew the results.
