Republican National Committee Co-Chair Michael Whatley shoots down Donald Trump’s claim that he would win the state of California if elections were “honest.”
In an hour long interview with television host Dr. Phil McGraw on Tuesday, Trump suggested that officials in California stole the election by not counting votes ‘honestly’.
“If Jesus Christ came down and was the vote counter, I would win California, OK?” Trump said. “In other words, if we had an honest vote counter, a really honest vote counter—I do great with Hispanics, great, I mean at a level no Republican has ever done—but if we had an honest vote counter, I would win California.”
Asked about Trump’s comments on Friday Whatley told local Fox LA anchor Elex Michaelson, “I think that he feels like California, there are a lot of Republicans and there are a lot of votes here. I think he was probably, you know, a little bit of a stretch,” according to a clip shared by Mediaite.
Michaelson noted that Trump lost California by about 5 million votes to Joe Biden in 2020.
“Do you have evidence that he actually won this state, that there were 5 million more people that voted for him that weren’t counted?”Michaelson pressed.
“No,” Whatley responded. “The president can tell stories at any time, but that’s look, I think the key is that we want to make the point that it is very important for us to have election security protection in place, that we are going to protect the ballot.”
A Republican presidential candidate has not won the California since George H. W. Bush in 1988. President Joe Biden won the state by nearly 30 points in 2020.
In the interview with Dr. Phil, Trump argued that he lost California due to widespread fraud in mail-in voting.
“It shouldn’t be allowed. It’s a whole different mindset,” he said, referring to mail-in ballots. “Republicans like to go in there Tuesday and vote. And that’s been for, you know, a long time, many years, decades, decades. It’s a custom almost. It’s a family custom. It’s a beautiful thing.”
But, Democrats “play a different game,”Trump claims. “You have ballot harvesting, but you also have people getting ballots. In California, you have people getting seven ballots. Democrats.”
There is no evidence to support Trump’s claim that there was widespread fraud in California’s election.
