There’s a difference between Trump’s exasperating nonsense and lies that put Americans at risk. His latest statement falls into the latter category.
Extremists are motivated by “perceived grievances fueled by false narratives. The Department of Homeland Security, issued a terrorism bulletin which was an apparent reference to Donald Trump’s anti-election rhetoric.
Last week, an assessment from the U.S. intelligence community went considerably further, alerting the public to the fact that “narratives of fraud” in the 2020 presidential election, among other things, “will almost certainly spur some [domestic violence extremists] to try to engage in violence this year.”
The “among other things” contributed to the uptick in violence against Asian Americans, from the elderly woman attacked in San Francisco to the shootings in Atlanta.
It was against this backdrop that the former president issued his latest written statement over the weekend, which read in part:
“Sadly the Election was Rigged, and without even going into detail, of which there is much, totally game changing. Democrats could not get Republican Legislatures in Swing States to approve many of the voting changes which took place before the Election, which is mandated under the Constitution of the United States. For that reason alone, we had an Illegitimate Election. The Supreme Court and other Courts were afraid to rule, they were ‘gutless,’ and will go down in history as such.”
Repeating the big lie and suggesting the details or “proof” that never existed are “game changing,” leaves his extremist audience to fill in the gaps with a variety of imaged grievances. And some will violently act out.
Let’s look at how the “game” may change for Trump.