Why Trump’s primetime speech is a THREAT to 2026 midterms

[0:00] It doesn't get bigger because without free and fair elections, you don't have a country. [0:08] As President Trump teasing his primetime speech set for tomorrow night, [0:12] two administration officials have told MSNOW that the speech will focus on voting machine [0:17] security and alleged foreign efforts to influence U.S. elections. The text of the speech is not [0:23] final, but Trump is expected to release a declassified intelligence documents on [0:28] both of those subjects. The officials tell MSNOW it's not clear if Trump will present any credible [0:34] new evidence specifically regarding claims of interference during the 2020 election. [0:40] We will once again note that extensive intel reviews under both the Trump and Biden administrations [0:46] found no basis for claims that the 2020 election was stolen. We do know, though, that four years [0:53] earlier, Russia certainly did meddle in the 2016 elections to Trump's benefit. [0:58] Joining us now, former U.S. ambassador to Denmark, Rufus Gifford. He also served as [1:02] chief of protocol under President Biden. Editor-at-large for Newsweek, CNBC founder Tom [1:08] Rogers with us. He's also senior advisor for Versant, MSNOW's parent company. And we're happy [1:12] to also be joined by former state attorney for Palm Beach County, Florida, Dave Arenberg. A great [1:17] group. My thanks to you all. Rufus, we'll start with you. We're going to go to Dave in a minute [1:21] as a reminder about the lack of evidence and the legal challenges that have already failed about [1:26] the 2020 election. Let's have you talk about the politics of it. There are a lot of Republicans [1:30] who this is the last thing they want President Trump to talk about. This is ancient history. It's [1:34] six years ago. It's not popular with the public. It reminds people of what happened on January 6th and [1:41] the like. Yet Trump persists to do it anyway. Oh, absolutely, Jonathan. I mean, I think this. [1:46] Look, the more that Democrats are, the more the Republicans, the president, the Republican Party [1:53] are talking about what happened six years ago, an election that, as we have said, has been [1:57] probably the election that has been counted, recounted, litigated more than any election [2:02] in the world, in particular in Georgia. The more that we need to be focused, we can be talking about [2:08] the issues that I think American voters really want to talk about. I can't think of an American voter [2:12] that's a swing voter in the 2026 election that has any interest in relitigating the Georgia election [2:19] of 2020. It is a political win for Democrats. There's no doubt that that is true. But we also [2:25] have to seize on it. I don't think we've been particularly effective as a party in seizing [2:30] on these opportunities of the Trump administration. And there's even some speculation that he'll claim [2:34] that the two senators, Warnock and Ossoff, who won in 2020, that they won so illegitimately [2:39] and shouldn't be seated, which, of course, there's zero, zero, zero evidence of that. [2:43] So, Dave Ehrenberg, let's go to you as a reminder, please. Just how many court cases did the Trump [2:48] people bring up post-November 2020 and remind those watching at home just how many they won? [2:57] Yeah, it was about 62. They lost all of them except for one small procedural victory. But from [3:03] the substance of it, they lost every substantial case they brought. Anything related to whether the [3:09] 2020 election was stolen. And if you want to help John Ossoff get elected in the landslide, [3:13] go after him, call him illegitimate and say the election was stolen. I mean, [3:17] that's a gift to the Democrats. This is a nightmare for the GOP. The issue of a stolen 2020 election [3:24] is a loser for Republicans. You're right. 60-plus judges already rejected the claims, including Bill [3:29] Barr, the attorney general and the head of Trump's cybersecurity agency. But this is a pretext [3:35] to an attempt to challenge the 2026 and 2028 election results and to try to federalize future [3:43] elections. So Trump is actually looking forward, not backwards. And he's going to try to conflate [3:48] foreign bad actors trying to sow discord, which is true with the election was stolen, [3:55] which is not true. And after all, if the 2020 election was really stolen, don't you think [4:00] we would have seen at least a single criminal charge from this Department of Justice relating [4:06] to this? This is the same agency that indicted James Comey over seashells, but nothing from DOJ [4:11] related to election interference. That tells you all you need to know. [4:15] Now, Dave, you're so right. Yes, it's a little bit about Trump's ego about losing in 2020, [4:18] but Tom Rogers, it's far more about setting up pretenses for 26 and 28. He's trying to get the [4:24] Save America Act pushed. Many people feel that would really restrict voting. It seems unlikely. It [4:28] seems like it won't go anywhere on the Hill. But you've been thinking about ways he can sort of [4:32] achieve similar objectives. Absolutely. I think we have a combination of desperation and obsession [4:38] on Trump's part here to do something to overturn the 2026 elections. Clearly, he's been frustrated by [4:46] Congress not passing Save America. He's been frustrated by the courts who have shot down his [4:51] attempts to change process when it comes to the midterms. And the question is, so what [4:58] does he do? And I think the speech tomorrow night, along with a number of other speeches [5:02] he's given, is about laying the groundwork for him to take action. He's going to claim [5:07] that the 2026 midterms were rigged if Democrats in key districts win that would turn Congress [5:15] into Democratic majorities. He will say the results can't be finalized until it's all investigated [5:22] because there was foreign interference or illegal immigrants voting. He would then probably order [5:28] Congress to organize around Republican majorities and say you can't seat members in districts where [5:35] we're questioning the results. I think what would follow from that is enormous street protests, [5:41] probably stimulating violence on his part by bringing in troops. And then it could get really [5:47] scary. There's something that hasn't been focused on at all called PEDS or presidential emergency [5:53] action documents. These are highly classified documents that have been in place since the [5:58] Eisenhower administration. When you hear Trump saying, I have a lot of powers that people don't [6:03] even know about or I have very strong emergency powers, he's probably referring to those. They've never [6:10] been used. They're in place to be signed in the event of a nuclear attack and civil society totally [6:16] disintegrates and president has to take some kind of emergency action. I think he's laying the [6:22] groundwork to be able to put those in effect, arrest and detain people without trial, seize election [6:30] machines. Obviously all that would be litigated. But we know the courts move a lot slower than the [6:34] administration would move in that kind of circumstance. And I think we're headed with all this communist [6:39] this threat talk of a bigger threat than World War I, World War II, Pearl Harbor and 9-11. He's talking [6:46] about something that he thinks is he's going to be able to turn into a major crisis to take actions [6:51] like that. We'd be naive not to think so. Yeah, and we are seeing some democratic officials starting [6:55] to sound the alarm on that.