In what is being perceived as a threat to democracy and the United States, several Republicans seem to be following former president Donald Trump’s lead and dropping hints that they might not accept the election results if they lose. President Joe Biden also said the same thing a few days back, calling election deniers “extremists” and warning that they were preparing to repeat Trump’s denial tactics in the November midterms.
Kari Lake, a former local TV anchor, who is running for Arizona governor, was evasive when asked on a podcast if she would concede in case she loses to Democrat Katie Hobbs.
“I’m not losing to Katie Hobbs. We have a movement. We are not losing to Katie Hobbs, so don’t worry about it,” she said.
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Earlier to CNN, she gave a similar reply when asked if she would accept the results of the November 8 midterms. “I’m going to win the election and I’m going to accept that result,” she said.
When asked if she will accept her loss, she again said, “I’m going to win the election and I will accept that result.”
Such direct reluctance to admit that she would accept any result has sent warning signals of the things to come. She is not the only Republican election denier to have hinted that they might act like Trump in their elections.
“There’s great danger that the Trump ‘big lie’ is going to spread to states all over the country. If election deniers lose their elections by narrow margins we can expect that they will reject the results and refuse to accept them,” Fred Wertheimer, president of the non-partisan group Democracy 21, told Guardian.
Despite widespread anger over the Capitol riots on January 6, 2021, following Trump’s questioning of the election process, several Republicans still question Biden’s win. An NBC poll says 65 per cent of Republican voters still view Biden’s presidency as illegitimate.
“The cancer that former president Trump injected into our electoral system has spread in 2022 to any number of candidates for important positions. They’re following the Trump playbook,” Wertheimer said.
The situation is dire in Arizona since all four Republican candidates, running for governor, US Senate, attorney general and secretary of state, are election deniers.
Blake Masters, who is contesting for the post of Arizona senator, has also been telling voters “to look out for thousands of fraudulent votes that will snatch victory from him”. Trump adopted similar tactics in 2016 and 2020.
Mark Finchem, running for secretary of state, was at the forefront to decertify Biden’s victory in Arizona and was also present at the US Capitol on January 6. He once even said he would refuse to concede.
Abe Hamadeh, the Republican running for Arizona attorney general, has made unsubstantiated claims that mail-in voting is riddled with fraud.
The problem is also apparent in Wisconsin, where Republican US senator Ron Johnson who is up for re-election and gubernatorial nominee Tim Michels have never said clearly that they will accept the results.
(With inputs from agencies)
