It was all rigged, Donald Trump says — insisting that an election he lost fair and square was stolen in the largest conspiracy in human history, nevermind no evidence. But something was indeed rigged on Election Day and thereafter: The reaction of Trump himself. The then-president had a totally precooked plan to declare victory, just as he later had carefully contrived plans to train an angry mob on the Capitol. The "big lie" that Joe Biden stole the presidency was advanced with the help of another interwoven big lie: that Trump and others were reacting to events as they unfolded. Nothing happened spontaneously.
Americans have long known about Trump’s plans to say he won the election before all the votes were counted. But audio just uncovered by Mother Jones reveals just how nefarious the plot really was.
In an hourlong diatribe to associates on Oct. 31, 2020, Trump strategist and confidant Steve Bannon details how it was going to (and did) work: “What Trump’s gonna do is just declare victory. Right? He’s gonna declare victory. But that doesn’t mean he’s a winner,” Bannon said, while laughing. “He’s just gonna say he’s a winner.”
Bannon explained that because Republicans were more likely to vote in person and Democrats more likely voted by mail, Democrats would “have a natural disadvantage” in shaping early public perceptions about who was ahead, Bannon said. “And Trump’s going to take advantage of it. That’s our strategy. He’s gonna declare himself a winner.
“So when you wake up Wednesday morning, it’s going to be a firestorm. You’re going to have antifa, crazy. The media, crazy. The courts are crazy. And Trump’s gonna be sitting there mocking, tweeting s--- out: ‘You lose. I’m the winner. I’m the king.’”
The truth about the lie fits perfectly with last week’s Jan. 6 hearing, which exposed that Trump’s plan all along was to urge the ginned-up, lied-to mob to train their ire, and their fire, on the U.S. Capitol.
He knew exactly what he was doing: deliberately undermining American democracy. That’s got to be a crime.
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