Latest / THE DAILY BRIEF / Trump uses debunked Michigan case to claim widespread voter fraud

Transcript

Trump uses debunked Michigan case to claim widespread voter fraud · THE DAILY BRIEF

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: During President Donald Trump's primetime address Thursday, he pointed to
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: a twenty twenty case in Michigan to demonstrate what he
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: called evidence of alleged fraud by a large scale voter
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: registration operation.
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: Among the disclosures tonight are FBI files detailing evidence of
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: alleged fraud by a large scale voter registration operation in Michigan.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: In twenty twenty, Michigan State Police rated a Democrat Get
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: Out the Vote organization corrupt group in Muskegan. The document
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: state that some canvassers admitted to FBI agents that they
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: signed voter registration forms and other people's names, submitted fraudulent
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: registration for people who did not exist, and received gift
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: cards tied to their number of applications that they produced.
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: In other words, it was pay play and cheat.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: That is an old conspiracy theory. Election officials have repeatedly
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: said that case is not evidence of widespread voter fraud,
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: even though there have been years of MAGA, Republicans and
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: election deniers trying to portray it that way. As a
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: spokesperson for the Michigan State Police told Michigan Advance Quote,
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: fraudulent voter registration forms had been created, but no fraudulent
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: voter registrations were processed and no ballots were cast. Investigators
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: concluded that the misconduct was carried out by a handful
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: of low level canvassers trying to inflate their productivity, not
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: as part of any coordinated effort to impact Michigan elections.
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: Not to mention, the FBI officially closed the investigation in
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: September twenty twenty five while Donald Trump was president, joining
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: US now as Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, whose office
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: investigated that case and referred it to the FBI for
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: PROSECUTUS Attorney General. We just laid out why what the
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: president said there's no evidence for. So I want to
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: focus with you on what he's laying the groundwork to
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: potentially do. Because, yes, the president's speech was talking about
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: past elections, but he was also very heavily focused and
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: called American elections written large quote, rigged and stolen. So
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: what are you preparing for? What do you think could
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: be one of the biggest risks here or the biggest
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: threats that he may try to do around the November election.
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: Well, I think that, as usual, the administration is focused
• 2:42
  Speaker 3: on Michigan in this year, in a year where he's
• 2:46
  Speaker 3: not on the ballot. I think what he's most focused
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: on is the fact that we have three congressional districts
• 2:52
  Speaker 3: for the US House of Representatives that are likely to flip.
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: The fourth, the seventh, and the tenth congressional districts are
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: all looking very much like they may flip. And the
• 3:02
  Speaker 3: last thing that President Trump wants is to have to
• 3:05
  Speaker 3: deal with the Democratic majority in the United States House
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: of Representatives, where of course a bare majority can issue
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: articles of impeachment. So, of course he's already trying to
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: sow the seats of doubt in our elections and to
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: undermine people's faith in the safety and the security of
• 3:24
  Speaker 3: our elections. I think it's important to note we have
• 3:27
  Speaker 3: sixteen hundred local clerks that actually administer the elections in Michigan.
• 3:32
  Speaker 3: It's a very decentralized system. Most of those clerks are Republicans.
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: And again, as you mentioned about the case that he
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: brought up in Mischigan, first of all, the Department of
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: Justice in those documents didn't even spell the name of
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: the city correctly, let alone get into the other facts right.
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: But as you indicated, this is a perfect example of
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: the system working effort to submit fraudulent registration forms. No
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: one was improperly registered to vote, and no one who
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: shouldn't have received a ballot. No one was able to
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: vote who shouldn't have been able to and no votes
• 4:13
  Speaker 3: were counted that should not have been counted. So again,
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: zero fraud when it comes to the actual results of
• 4:21
  Speaker 3: the election. But I really think what the administration is
• 4:25
  Speaker 3: trying to do is it really to distract you from
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: all the things that are making them deeply unpopular. You know.
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: They want to distract us from the price of gas
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: or ground beef. They want to distract us from the
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: Forever War or that was started and ran, and they
• 4:39
  Speaker 3: want to distract from the graft and the massive amounts
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: of corruption being perpetrated by the Trump administration. So we
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: had very state and secure and accurate elections in Michigan.
• 4:50
  Speaker 3: It's just that the Trump administration wants people to believe otherwise.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 4:55
  Speaker 4: But you know a lot of this is going I'm
• 4:57
  Speaker 4: very glad to have you on. But whatever Donald Trump
• 4:59
  Speaker 4: and is team are planning and thinking about when it
• 5:01
  Speaker 4: comes to the election, a lot of it is going
• 5:04
  Speaker 4: to happen and going to require folks like you across
• 5:07
  Speaker 4: the country attorney general attorneys general to sue and go
• 5:11
  Speaker 4: into the court of law. So what is the plan,
• 5:15
  Speaker 4: Because we have been seeing Donald Trump and his team
• 5:19
  Speaker 4: lay out a blueprint for what they're going to do.
• 5:21
  Speaker 4: They're not being quiet about it in any way, shape
• 5:23
  Speaker 4: or form. What do you and I assume other attorneys
• 5:26
  Speaker 4: general are constantly contact with each other, what is the
• 5:30
  Speaker 4: actual plan to protect the voters from the federal government.
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: Well, first of all, you know, as we do every
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: election cycle, we do tabletop exercises over and over and
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: over again, and that involves you know, my department, the
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: Department of State, the Secretary of State's office, the Michigan
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: State Police, the Governor's office, you know, all levels of
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: law enforcement. But also, yeah, we are prepared to sue.
• 5:58
  Speaker 3: Myself and the other Democratic age have worked very hard
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: so that we can try our best to contemplate every scenario,
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: every circumstance, and we're ready to go into court. And
• 6:10
  Speaker 3: I think in many cases we're going to have to
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: go into court ahead of time. One of the problems, ironically,
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: that we've been seeing is we try sometimes to go
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: into court to stop something that would be illegal a
• 6:23
  Speaker 3: violation of state law, federal law, or the Constitution, and
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: we base it upon the very words of the president,
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: and sometimes the courts will tell us we don't actually
• 6:35
  Speaker 3: know if the President means this or not, because he
• 6:39
  Speaker 3: says a lot of ridiculous things, and I guess if
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: we had to believe everything he said, we already would
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: have occupied an invaded Greenland. So that part is a
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: little difficult, but we're prepared to go into court as
• 6:52
  Speaker 3: quickly as possible in order to defend the rights of
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: our voters and our poll workers, and our clerks and
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: our second carrieres of state who are under threat by
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: this administration. And it's very clear they're just trying to
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: scare people and intimidate them so that they don't show
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: up to the polls and don't vote, and they're trying
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: to scare the very people who administer our elections. And
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: we're going to do everything we can to fight back
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: in order to uphold our democracy here in Michigan and
• 7:20
  Speaker 3: across the United States.