Trump demands Ga. loss overturned in call
Offifficial tells president ‘data you have is wrong’ ahead of Senate runoffffffffffff.
President Donald Trump badgered and berated Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in a call Saturday, repeating falsehoods about his election defeat in Georgia— the latest example of the extraordinary pressure he’s exerted on state Republican offifficials ahead of critical runoffffffffffffs for control of the U.S. Senate.
Raffffffffffffensperger refuseddemands fromTrump to overturn the election results, telling him that the “data you have is wrong” as he pushed back onTrump’s theories of “stuffffffffffffed ballot boxes” that the president saidwould reverse Joe Biden’s roughly 12,000-vote victory in Georgia.
“Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break. We have that in spades already,” Trump said, suggestingmore legal action. “Or we can keep it going. But that’s not fair to the voters of Georgia.”
A recording of the roughly hourlong call was obtained on Sunday by The Atlanta
Journal-Constitution and was confifirmed by two people involved in the conversation. Itwas disclosed a day before Trump is set to stage a rally in northwest Georgia for U.S. Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loefflffler.
Throughout the call, Trump invoked debunked conspiracy theories about widespread voter fraud and continued to urge Raffensperger to reverse the election outcome, repeating falsehoods about ballot boxes “stuffffffffffffed with votes” and other unproven narratives.
“We won this election in Georgia based on all of this. There’s nothing wrong with saying that, Brad. The people of Georgia are angry and these numbers are going to be repeated on Monday night,” Trumpsaid, adding: “There’snothingwrongwith saying that you’ve recalculated.”
State and federal elections officials have said there’s no evidence of widespread irregularities in Georgia and other battleground states, and courts at every level have dismissed challenges fromTrump’s campaign and its allies seeking to overturn Georgia’s close election.
At one point in the conversation, the president said that “I justwant tofifind11,780 votes” — one more than the vote gap between him and Biden, who became the fifirst Democrat to flip the state since 1992.
“It’s pretty clear that we won. We won pretty substantially. And you even see it by rally size,” Trump said, later accusing one of Raffffffffffffensperger’s attorneys of being a “Never Trumper.”
“There’s justnoway. Look, there’s no way. There’s no way.”
Raffffffffffffensperger, sounding exasperated, responded forcefully at one point in the back-and-forth: “Well, Mr. President, the challenge youhave is the data youhave is wrong.”
Later, close to the end of the conversation, Raffensperger interjected that Trump was falling victim to false conspiracy theories he’s seen on Twitter.
“Mr. President, the problem you have with social media is that people can say anything.”
“No, this isn’t socialmedia. This is Trump media,” the president responded. “You shouldwant to have anaccurate election and you’re a Republican.”
“We believewedohave an accurate election,” Raffffffffffffensperger replied.
“No you don’t. No. Noyou don’t. You don’t have it — not even close.”
Among the people on the call were Raffensperger, White House Chief of Staffff Mark Meadows and several aides and attorneys, includingWashington lawyerCleta Mitchell. Seeking to defuse the tension, Meadows urged Georgiaoffifficials “in the spirit of cooperation and compromise” to fifind a path forward thatdoesn’t involve the court system.
“We don’t agree that you have one, Raffensperger responded.
At another juncture in the conversation, Trump chastised Raffensperger for a recentTVappearancewhere hesaidtherewasnosystemic fraud in Georgia.
“I know you would like to get to the bottom of it,” Trump said, adding: “People should be happy to have an accurate count, instead of an election where there’s turmoil. There’s turmoil in Georgia and other places — you’re not the only one. We have other states I believe will be flipping to us very shortly.”
The president has feuded withRaffffffffffffenspergerandother Republicans forweeks, blaming themforhis narrowelection defeat in Georgia. The call came shortly before he was set to headline a rally today for Loefflffler and Perdue ahead of Tuesday’s runoffffffffffffs for control of the U.S. Senate.
Republicans worry that Trump’s ceaseless attacks onRaffffffffffffensperger, Gov. Brian Kemp and other state GOP fifigures has undermined the party’s unity and is sending conflflicting messages to the president’s loyalists before pivotal elections against Democrats Jon Ossoffff and Raphael Warnock. Trump suggested the Republicans could lose if Raffffffffffffensperger didn’t intervene on his behalf.
“It’s going to have a big impact on Tuesday if you guys don’t get this thing straightened out fast,” said Trump. At another point in the conversation, hewarned that a “lot of people aren’t going out to vote” in the runoffs to send a message to Raffffffffffffensperger.
“A lot of Republicans are going to vote negative because they hate what you did to the president.”
Trump lashed out in particular at StaceyAbrams, the Democratic former gubernatorial candidatewho he said “outsmarted you at every step” with a consent decree inMarchthataddresses accusations about a lack of statewide standards for judging signatures on absentee ballot envelopes.
And he vented at Kemp for not doingmore to intervene in the election results.
“LikeaschmuckIendorsed him,” he said, adding: “The people are so angry in Georgia, I can’t imagine he’s ever getting elected again.”
But much of the call was squarely aimed at Raffensperger, a fifirst- termRepublicanwho alsowill likely face a primary challenge in 2022.
“They’re laughing at you. You’ve taken a state that’s a Republican state and you’ve madeitalmost impossiblefor aRepublican to win because of cheating — because they cheated like nobody’s ever cheatedbefore,” Trumpsaid, venting later that the call is “going nowhere.”
At each turn, Raffensperger and his attorney, RyanGermany, pushed back at the false claims.
“That’s not accurate, Mr. President,” Germany said. “The numbers we are showing are accurate.”