Amid his marathon press conference last week, with an array of missteps, one stunning diatribe from President Joe Biden deserves further analysis.
Biden was twice asked by reporters whether we could again trust the electoral system, and the president argued a fair election was unlikely unless the Democrats’ major election power grab was passed.
“I think it could easily be illegitimate,” Biden said. “The increase of the prospect of it being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed.”
Embattled Vice President Kamala Harris, summoned to ramble on the Thursday morning shows, offered a similar position in various incoherent ways.
House Majority Whip James Clyburn agreed on CNN that November’s elections would be illegitimate if “voting rights” bills failed.
Political machinations first, last and always for the left.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki had to clean up her boss’s mess and explain how “POTUS was not casting doubt on the legitimacy of the 2022 election,” then took a shot at his predecessor.
He was explaining that the results would be illegitimate if states do what the former president asked them to do after the 2020 election: toss out ballots and overturn results after the fact. The Big Lie is putting our democracy at risk. We’re fighting to protect it.
— Jen Psaki (@PressSec) January 20, 2022
But Biden didn’t say that. And unfortunately he’s made these kinds of dangerous claims before.
Joe Biden just now in Erie, PA: "The only way we lose this is by the chicanery going on with regard to polling places.”
— Tyler Pager (@tylerpager) October 10, 2020
And these musings are more parlous than former President Donald Trump’s grievances — which he possibly gleaned from his days as a Democrat — since the left has played this repugnant game for decades.
Looking back at recent left-wing conspiracies, despite no evidence that Trump or Russian assets changed a solitary vote five years ago, almost two in three Democrats still felt Putin tampered with our electoral tallies. How many liberals still feel this way today? That’s a worthwhile poll for universities and mainstream journalists to pursue.
But these same entities never expressed outrage when their progressive allies questioned the 2016 presidential election, nor when Hillary Clinton claimed several times after her loss that Trump was an “illegitimate” president.
Clinton’s campaign chair John Podesta even told Biden not to concede in 2020 and sought to convince blue state governors to send pro-Biden electors to the Electoral College to effectively steal the race, had Trump won.
Now they want to unnecessarily overhaul the system. It’s Orwellian, since Americans across party lines agree it’s never been easier to vote, and turnout hit record numbers in 2020 despite COVID-19. There’s no “voter suppression,” and a vast majority support voter identification laws. Democrats simply concoct non-issues to federalize their power with defeat on the horizon.
It was unfortunate for the United States when Democrats peddled conspiracies following the 2000, 2004, and 2016 presidential sweepstakes — as well as a 2018 Georgia gubernatorial race where the loser still hasn’t conceded — and bad when Trump cast doubt on the 2020 elections; so it’s equally bad when Biden questions the legitimacy of the upcoming midterm elections.
Biden should dispense with nonsense and focus on real issues — like rampant crime, soaring inflation, teachers unions hurting children, the southern border fiasco his presidency created, international affairs, and more.
As Republicans did far better than expected in 2020, Biden was narrowly elected to be a moderate caretaker president after a chaotic four years. He even promised that humility during his inaugural address, yet his governing style has been the polar opposite. Under his regime, everything has gotten worse, and defensively peddling fringe theories augments the pain we all feel.
A.J. Kaufman
A.J. Kaufman is an Alpha News columnist. His work has appeared in the Baltimore Sun, Florida Sun-Sentinel, Indianapolis Star, Israel National News, Orange County Register, St. Cloud Times, Star-Tribune, and across AIM Media Midwest and the Internet. Kaufman previously worked as a school teacher and military historian.
