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Donald Trump

Ad Hominems & Credibility: Michael Cohen Edition

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As this is being written, Michael Cohen is testifying before the same congress he was convicted of lying to. This time he claims that he is telling the truth, despite that past lie. As would be expected, Democrats are focused on using Cohen’s testimony against Trump and the Republicans. As would also be expected, Republicans are claiming the hearing is a waste of time and are focusing on discrediting Cohen. As would be suspected, the public will tend to line up along ideological lines—the left accepting the negative things Cohen say about Trump, the right rushing to defend Trump by attacking Cohen.

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Since Cohen lied to congress in defense of Donald Trump and has an impressive criminal record composed primarily of fraud and deceit, it is no surprise that the Republicans are focusing on these facts. The gist of their attack on him is that what he says about Trump should be rejected because he is a known liar. Interestingly, this approach can turn out to be an ad hominem fallacy or a legitimate assessment of credibility, depending on the reasoning being used.

The ad Hominem is a general category of fallacies in which a claim or argument is rejected based on some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument. Typically, this fallacy involves two steps. First, an attack against the character of person making the claim, her circumstances, or her actions is made (or the character, circumstances, or actions of the person reporting the claim). Second, this attack is taken to be evidence against the claim or argument the person in question is making (or presenting). This type of “argument” has the following form:

Premise 1. Person A makes claim X.

Premise 2. Person B makes an attack on person A.

Conclusion. Therefore A’s claim is false.

The reason why an ad Hominem (of any kind) is a fallacy is that the character, circumstances, or actions of a person do not (in most cases) have a bearing on the truth or falsity of the claim being made (or the quality of the argument being made).

If the Republican argument is as follows, then it would be the ad hominem fallacy:

Premise 1. Michael Cohen claims Trump knew in advance about the WikiLeaks plan.

Premise 2. Michael Cohen is a liar.

Conclusion. Therefore, Trump did not know in advance about the WikiLeaks plan.

This is obviously bad logic, as is shown by the following example:

Premise 1. Michael Cohen said that he is married.

Premise 2. Michael Cohen is a liar.

Conclusion. Therefore, Michael Cohen is not married.

Or, to really drive the point home,

Premise 1. Michael Cohen said that 2+2=4.

Premise 2. Michael Cohen is a liar.

Conclusion. Therefore, 2+2 does not equal 4.

So, to conclude that a specific claim made by Cohen is false because Cohen is a liar and a convicted criminal would be to fall victim to this fallacy. As always, it must be noted that the conclusion of a fallacy can be true—to infer that a fallacy must have a false conclusion would be to fall victim to the fallacy fallacy. As such, the claims that Cohen makes must be assessed on their merits—the fact that he is a criminal and a liar is not evidence that any specific claim he makes is not true.

At this point one might be thinking the obvious—surely the fact that he is a liar and a criminal has some relevance! It does—these facts reduce his credibility. When it comes to assessing credibility, many factors come into play and these obviously include the honesty and character of the person. A person who is known to be a liar and to have committed crimes of deceit clearly has reduced credibility. This reduced credibility does not, as discussed above, prove that a specific claim made by the person is false. However, reduced credibility means that one has less reason to accept a claim made by the person.

Given that Cohen has been shown to have lied to benefit Trump and himself in the past, it is rational to consider that he might be lying now. Thus, it would be sensible to be skeptical about his claims. However, a lack of credibility does not count as evidence against a claim, it just means that one has reason to be concerned about accepting a claim based on the person’s credibility. In practical terms, it would be unwise to believe a claim solely based on Cohen’s testimony. However, his lack of credibility does not diminish or reduce the support provided by other evidence. For example, the evidence is overwhelming that Cohen paid Stormy Daniels $130,000 in hush money at the behest of Trump. The fact that Cohen is a liar and said this before congress does not make that claim false.

In sum, attacking Cohen does not prove his specific claims are false—they must be assessed on their own merits. However, Cohen’s track record of lying does reduce his credibility so his testimony alone does not suffice to establish a claim.

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Voter Fraud & Florida, Again

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After a contentious recount, Bill Nelson has conceded the senate race to Rick Scott. Before the recount, both President Trump and Rick Scott said, without evidence, that the election had been tainted with widespread fraud. Trump even advanced the bizarre claim of voters changing clothes in their cars to vote again.  As this is being written, the election has come to an end without any evidence of voter fraud or other electoral misdeeds. To be fair, there were problems in some counties—especially Broward. There were also problems with ballot design, but this did not seem to favor any particular candidate. Good ballot design is difficult, but it should be something that enjoys bipartisan support—since such design flaws would generally seem to provide no advantage to either side. Rather importantly, as has long been the case, felons were not permitted to vote—thus disenfranchising about 1.5 million citizens.  This race-driven policy has been, in part, undone in this past election, which might change elections to come. But, let us return to the allegations of fraud.

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Given that there has been no evidence of fraud or other illegalities, it might be wondered why Trump and Scott pushed their lies so hard on the national stage. One obvious reason is that the untrue claim of voter fraud has been a stock talking point for the Republicans for a long time. As such, it makes sense that Trump and Scott would parrot this party line—it has become something Republicans just seem to say. Interestingly, both Trump and Scott made these accusations in the face of their own victories, so one could say that Trump and Scott said they won fraudulent elections. In the case of Trump, he was enraged that he had been thrashed in the popular vote while winning by the electoral college (something he had railed against in the past).

It should be noted that the Democrats have a narrative of voter suppression which they present at least as often as Republicans cry out about voter fraud. But, there is a difference: voter fraud is infinitesimal while voter suppression has a meaningful impact on elections.  In the case of Scott, he was clearly worried that he might lose, which leads to a second likely reason.

Second, Scott had an excellent practical reason to raise the specter of fraud: there was a chance that he might lose the election. Presumably he hoped that this would benefit him in the realm of public opinion or otherwise yield some advantage in achieving victory—perhaps by ending the vote counting early. To be fair to Scott, Democrats bring up voter suppression when they are losing (or have lost). But, as noted before, Scott and Trump have never been able to provide evidence of voter fraud, but there is clear evidence of voter suppression. The most obvious examples in Florida are the racist law excluding felons from voting and Scott’s Kafkaesque process for restoring voting rights. Scott has openly claimed the process is arbitrary and the available information shows that Scott favored restoring voting rights to whites and Republicans.  Florida has about 1.5 million felons who could vote, so Scott’s control over the restoration voting rights gave him considerable power over elections. As such, while fraud did not cost him the election, his control over felon’s voting rights helped him achieve victory.

Third, the deceitful narrative of fraud is used to “justify” various efforts aimed at voter suppression. By bringing up claims of voter fraud before a national audience, Trump and Scott can help fuel voter suppression across the country. The fact that they provide no evidence seems to be irrelevant, those that fear voter fraud are clearly motivated by emotion rather than evidence. When the Republicans try to suppress votes in the future, they can refer to the fraud that never was in Florida to help get laws passed and “justify” them to the public. This leads to the point of why crying fraud matters.

For those who believe that citizens should be able to freely exercise their just right to vote, using the specter of voter fraud to justify the suppression of voters would clearly be wrong. After all, it is a lie used to justify robbing citizens of a fundamental democratic right. In fact, the right to vote is the defining right of a democracy. There is also the obvious moral problem with lying.

Another problem is that such false claims can undermine the faith of citizens in the election system and hence democracy itself. This can drive down participation—people who think that their vote will not be counted or will be washed away in a tide of fraud might be less inclined to vote. The United States already has low voter participation, in part because the process is often made difficult by various laws and, of course, by the inefficiency and disorder of many elections. Given the available technology, the fact that elections are run so badly would suggest that this is a feature and not a bug. The attack on voting can also be used to pave the way towards non-democratic systems as people lose faith in the democratic process.

It might be objected that cries of voter suppression are also damaging. On the one hand, it could be argued that such accusations could lower turnout and undermine faith in the system. On the other hand, voter suppression occurs and the efforts to counter voter suppression aim at encouraging people to vote and making it easier for legitimate voters to vote. As such, when people bring up voter suppression honestly and oppose it, they are helping democracy and not harming it.

It can also be objected that voter suppression is a liberal myth. However, the evidence for voter suppression is quite strong. The American Bar Association offers a run through of various voter ID laws, noting their impact. In terms of hard data on the impact of laws, researchers at Tufts and Harvard are working on a system to sort this matter out. Georgia, where the person in charge of the electoral process just won the governor’s race, is a paradigm example of voter suppression. And, I have often noted, the laws against felons voting are intended to suppress African-American voters and do so quite effectively. My home state of Maine allows felons who are still in prison to vote. While I like to think of my home state as enlightened, it is also worth noting that Maine did not have a minority population to suppress.

There are also the facts that the laws that are supposed to be aimed at voter fraud are aimed at something that rarely happens and that they do not really address the fraud that does occur. As such, one has to infer that either the Republicans are stupidly and badly trying to stop a problem that is not really a problem with methods that do not work or they are trying to suppress Democratic voters. The best explanation seems clear.

Naturally, I am open to evidence and arguments against my views. If there is strong objective evidence of significant voter fraud and strong objective evidence that the methods used to address it are effective, then I will change my position. Also, if there is strong objective evidence that voter suppression is a myth and that there are no unreasonable barriers to voting, then I will change my position on voter suppression.

 

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Red Hen, Mr. Rogers and Civility

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One of the many important lessons I learned from sports was to maintain civility and respect for others even in heated competition. This lesson was reinforced when I competed in debate and by gaming hobby. When I became an academic, these lessons served me well by allowing me to easily behave in a professional manner: respectfully disagreeing with my colleagues.

While civil behavior is generally respected, I have taken some criticism in the past for being too civil and respectful—even when people are rude or awful to me, I rarely abandon my commitment to the social rituals of respectful and civil behavior. I will, however, admit that one reason why I do this is that I believe that honorable behavior in the face of rudeness demonstrates good character and shows the failings of the one who descends into rudeness. As such, I do hold to a moral foundation for civility as well as a bit of pride—not descending to the lower level is a point of honor for me.

Since I am a professional philosophy, I approach political differences as I would any theoretical dispute about values. That is, I maintain my professionalism even in in nonprofessional contexts. This serves me quite well in maintaining friendships with people who have vary different political values. For example, I have various running friends who are very conservative politically. However, we get along quite well even though I hold to many liberal and even anarchist positions in politics.

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Because of my views of civility, it might be expected that I would roundly condemn the apparent incivility shown to members of the Trump administration, such as Sanders.  After all, as you might infer from the above, I endeavor to avoid descending into incivility. Despite this, a case can be made that morally justifies such incivility.

I do believe that by default each person should be treated with basic civility—that is the starting point. People can, by their actions, change the level of respect they deserve. For example, people who treat others with respect are thus entitled to that respect in return. As another example, someone who is abusive and disrespectful reduces the respect they are due. Morality is also a key factor here—goodness is to be respected and evil is to be shunned.

In the case of political disputes, I do not assume that a person who disagrees with me must be evil and thus has no claim to respect or civility. If the person shares enough of the essential core values with me, I can accept that while we disagree they are a good person (or at least not evil) who is worthy of respect and civility. For example, while I disagree with my conservative friends on various issues, we still share essential core values about honesty, kindness, fairness, justice, democracy, and dogs. To use a specific illustration, my conservative friends and I both believe that people in need should not be abandoned to their fate. I tend to favor social programs that address this matter, while they tend to prefer a somewhat different approach. However, we agree with the basic ethics of the parable of the good Samaritan. So, my general point here is that civility is owed to those who have morally good core values even when there are heated disputes over political matters. Roughly put, the decent are entitled to decency.

In the case of people who are deficient in the core values and act in accord with their moral defects, they earn the disrespect of others. For example, someone who lies repeatedly and acts in other awful ways forfeits the claim to civility to the degree they are awful. As such, being uncivil to Sarah Sanders would be morally acceptable to the degree that she lies—which is regularly and extensively.

Another key part of civility is reciprocity. People merit civil treatment by being civil; they merit uncivil treatment by being uncivil. As such, people who are insulting, rude, and disrespectful have no right to expect others to treat them with civility and respect. Trump, for example, exemplifies uncivil behavior and hence has no right to expect civility from others. While he no doubt expects the respect due the office, my view is that the idea of respecting the office despite the behavior of the person in that office is absurd—on par with asking people to respect an ass in a nice car because the nice car is nice. A person is, rather, obligated to act in accord with the respect the office is supposed to command, otherwise it is they who are disrespecting the office and not those who disrespect the disrespectful occupant.

Thus, civility is only owed to those who are good (or at least not evil) or those who act with civility. Those who claim that the evil or uncivil should be treated with civility are in error, though people are free to be more civil than they are morally required to be.

 

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Trump's White Nationalists

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While the election of Obama led some to believe that racism had been exorcized, the triumph of Trump caused speculation that the demon had merely retreated to the shadows of the internet. In August of 2017, the city of Charlottesville, VA served as the location of a “United the Right” march. This march, which seems to have been a blend of neo-Nazis, white-supremacists and other of the alt-right, erupted in violence. One woman who was engaged in a counter-protest against the alt-right, Heather Heyer, was murdered. Officers Cullen and Bates were also killed when their helicopter crashed, although this appears to have been an accident.

While Trump strikes like an enraged wolverine against slights real or imaginary against himself, his initial reply to the events in Charlottesville were tepid. As has been his habit, Trump initially resisted being critical of white supremacists and garnered positive remarks from the alt-right for their perception that he has created a safe space for their racism. This weak response has, as would be expected, been the target of criticism from both the left and the more mainstream right.

Since the Second World War, condemning Nazis and Neo-Nazis has been extremely easy and safe for American politicians. Perhaps the only thing easier is endorsing apple pie. Denouncing white supremacists can be more difficult, but since the 1970s this has also been an easy move, on par with expressing a positive view of puppies in terms of the level of difficulty. This leads to the question of why Trump and the Whitehouse responded with “We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides, on many sides” rather than explicitly condemning the alt-right. After all, Trump pushes hard to identify acts of terror by Muslims as Islamic terror and accepts the idea that this sort of identification is critical to fighting such terror. Consistency would seem to require that Trump identify terror committed by the alt-right as “alt-right terror”, “white-supremacist terror”, “neo-Nazi terror” or whatever would be appropriate. Trump, as noted above, delayed making specific remarks about white supremacists.

Some have speculated that Trump is a racist. Trump denies this, pointing to the fact that his beloved daughter married a Jew and converted to Judaism. While Trump does certainly make racist remarks, it is not clear if he embraces an ideology of racism or any ideology at all beyond egoism and self-interest. While the question of whether he is a racist is certainly important, there is no need to speculate on the matter when addressing his response (or lack of response). What matters is that the weakness of his initial response and his delay in making a stronger response sends a clear message to the alt-right that Trump is on their side, or at least is very tolerant of their behavior. It could be claimed that the alt-right is like a deluded suitor who thinks someone is really into them when they are not, but this seems implausible. After all, Trump is very easy on the alt-right and must be pushed, reluctantly, into being critical. If he truly condemned them, he would have reacted as he always does against things he does not like: immediately, angrily, repeatedly and incoherently. Trump, by not doing this, sends a clear message and allows the alt-right to believe that Trump does not really mean it when he condemns them days after the fact. As such, while Trump might not be a racist, he does create a safe space for racists. As Charlottesville and other incidents show, the alt-right presents a more serious threat to American lives than does terror perpetrated by Muslims. As such, Trump is not only abetting the evil of racism, he could be regarded as an accessory to murder.

It could be countered that Trump did condemn the bigotry, violence and hatred and thus his critics are in error. One easy and obvious reply is that although Trump did say he condemns these things, his condemnation was not directed at the perpetrators of the violence. After seeming to be on the right track towards condemning the wrongdoers, Trump engaged in a Trump detour by condemning the bigotry and such “on many sides.” This could, of course, be explained away: perhaps Trump lost his train of thought, perhaps Trump had no idea what was going on and decided to try to cover his ignorance, or perhaps Trump was just being Trump. While these explanations are tempting, it is also worth considering that Trump was using the classic rhetorical tactic of false equivalence—treating things that are not equal as being equal. In the case at hand, Trump can be seen as regarding those opposing the alt-right as being just as bigoted, hateful and violent as the alt-right’s worst members. While there are hateful bigots who want to do violence to whites, the real and significant threat is not from those who oppose the alt-right, but from the alt-right. After all, the foundation of the alt-right is bigotry and hatred. Hating Neo-Nazis and white supremacists is the morally correct response and does not make one equivalent or even close to being the same as them.

One problem with Trump’s false equivalence is that it helps feed the narrative that those who actively oppose the alt-right are bad people—evil social justice warriors and wicked special snowflakes. This encourages people who do not agree with the alt-right but do not like the left to focus on criticizing the left rather than the alt-right.  However, opposing the alt-right is the right thing to do.  Another problem with Trump’s false equivalence is that it encourages the alt-right by allowing them to see such remarks as condemning their opponents—they can tell themselves that Trump does not really want to condemn his alt-right base but must be a little critical because of politics.  While Trump might merely be pragmatically appealing to his base and selfishly serving his ego, his tolerance for the alt-right is damaging to the country and will certainly contribute to more murders.

 

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Guarding the Trumps

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While it has not always been the case, the current practice is for the American taxpayer to foot the bill for extensive protection of the president and their family. When Bush was president, there were complaints from the left about the costs incurred protecting him when he went to his ranch. When Obama was president, the right criticized him for the cost of his vacations and trips. Not surprisingly, Trump was extremely critical of the expenses incurred by Obama and claimed that if he were president he would rarely leave the White House. Since Trump is now president, it can be seen if he is living in accord with his avowed principles regarding incurring costs and leaving the White House.

While Trump has only been president for roughly a month, he has already made three weekend trips to his Mar-a-Lago club since the inauguration. While the exact figures are not available, the best analysis places the cost at about $10 million for the three trips. In addition to the direct cost to taxpayers, a visit from Trump imposes heavy costs on Palm Beach Country which are estimated to be tens of thousands of dollars each day.

Trump’s visit also has an unfortunate spillover cost to the Lantana Airport which is located six miles from Mar-a-Lago. When Trump visits, the Secret Service shuts down the airport. Since the airport is the location of twenty businesses, the shut down costs these businesses thousands of dollars. For example, a banner-flying business claims to have lost $40,000 in contracts to date. As another example, a helicopter company is moving its location in response to the closures. The closures also impact the employees and the surrounding community.

Since Trump also regularly visits Trump tower and his wife and youngest son live there, the public is forced to pay for security. The high-end estimate of the cost is $500,000 per day, but it is probably less—especially when it is just Melania and her son staying there. It must be noted that it cost Chicago about $2.2 million to protect Obama’s house from election day until inauguration day. However, Obama and his family took up residence in the White House and thus did not require the sort of ongoing protection of multiple locations that Trump now expects.

The rest of Trump’s family also enjoys security at the taxpayers’ expense—when Eric Trump took a business trip to Uruguay it cost the country about $100,000 in hotel room bills. Given that such trips might prove common for Trump’s family members, ongoing expenses can be expected.

The easy an obvious reply to these concerns is that the protection of the president and their family is established policy. Just as Bush and Obama enjoyed expensive and extensive protection, Trump should also enjoy that protection as a matter of consistent policy. As such, there is nothing especially problematic with what Trump is doing. Trump himself also contends that while he attacked Obama for taking vacations, when he goes to Mar-a-Lago and New York, it is for work. For example, he met the prime minister of Japan at Mar-a-Lago for some diplomatic clubbing and not for a weekend vacation in Florida.

A reasonable counter to this reply is to point out the obvious: there is no compelling reason why Trump needs to conduct government business at Trump Tower and Mar-a-Lago. Other than the fact that Trump wants to go to these places and publicize them for his own gain, there is nothing special about them that would preclude conducting government business in the usual locations. As such, these excessive expenses are needless and unjustified.

There is also the harm being done to the communities that must bear the cost of Trump and his family and the financial harm being done to the Lantana Airport. Trump, who professes to be a great friend of the working people and business, is doing considerable harm to the businesses at the airport and doing so for no legitimate reason. This make his actions not only financially problematic, but also morally wrong—he is doing real and serious harm to citizens when there is no need to do so.

There is also an additional moral concern about what Trump is doing, namely that his business benefits from what he is doing. Both the Defense Department and Secret Service apparently plan on renting space in Trump Tower, thus enabling Trump to directly profit from being president. If the allegedly financially conservative Republicans were truly concerned about wasting taxpayer money, they would refuse this funding and force Trump to follow the practices of his predecessors. Or, if Trump insists on staying at Trump tower, the government should require that he pay all the costs himself. After all, being at Trump Tower benefits him and not the American people. Trump also gains considerable free publicity and advertising by conducting state business at his own business locations. He can, of course, deny that this is his intent—despite all the evidence to the contrary.

Just as the conservative critics of Obama were right to keep a critical eye on his travel expenses, they should do the same for Trump. While Trump can, as noted above, make the case that he is at least doing some work while he is at Trump tower and Mar-a-Lago, there is the reasonable concern that Trump is incurring needless expenses and doing significant harm to the finances of the local communities and businesses. After all, there is no reason Trump needs to work at his tower or club. As such, Trump should not take these needless and harmful trips and the fiscal conservatives should be leading the call to reign in this waster of public money and enemy of small businesses.

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Is Trump's Presidency Legitimate?

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Representative John Lewis, a man who was nearly killed fighting for civil rights, has claimed that Trump is not a legitimate president. While some dismiss this as mere sour grapes, it is certainly an interesting claim and one worth given some consideration.

The easy and obvious legal answer is that Trump’s presidency is legitimate: despite taking a trouncing in the popular vote, Trump won the electoral college. As such, he is the legitimate president by the rules of the system. It does not matter that Trump him denounced the electoral college as “a disaster for democracy”, what matters is the rules of the game. Since the voters have given tacit acceptance of the system by participating and not changing it, the system is legitimate and thus Trump is the legitimate president from this legal standpoint. From a purely practical standpoint, this can be regarded as the only standpoint that matters. However, there are other notions of legitimacy that are distinct from the legal acquisition of power.

In a democratic system of government, one standard of legitimacy is that the majority of the citizens vote for the leader. This can, of course, be amended to a majority vote by the citizens who bother to vote—assuming that voters are not unjustly disenfranchised and that there is not significant voter fraud or election tampering. On this ground, Hillary Clinton is the legitimate president since she received the majority of the votes. This can be countered by arguing that the majority of the citizens, as noted above, accepted the existing electoral system and hence are committed to the results. This does create an interesting debate about whether having the consent of the majority justifies the acceptance of an electoral system that can elect a president who does not win a majority of the votes. As would be suspected, people tend to think this system is just fine when their candidate wins and complain when their candidate loses. But, this is not a principled view of the matter.

Another standard of legitimacy is that the election process is free of fraud and tampering. To the degree the integrity of the electoral system is in question, the legitimacy of the elected president is in doubt. Since the 1990s the Republican party has consistently claimed that voter fraud occurs and is such a threat that it must be countered by such measures as imposing voter ID requirements. With each election, the narrative grows.  What is most striking is that although Trump won the electoral college, he and his team have argued that the integrity of the election was significantly compromised. Famously, Trump tweeted that millions had voted illegally. While the mainstream media could find no evidence of this, Trump’s team has claimed that they have evidence to support Trump’s accusation.

While it seems sensible to dismiss Trump’s claims as the deranged rantings of a delicate man whose fragile ego was wounded by Hillary crushing him in the popular vote, the fact that he is now president would seem to require that his claims be taken seriously. Otherwise, it must be inferred that he is a pathological liar with no credibility who has slandered those running the election and American voters and is thus unworthy of the respect of the American people. Alternatively, his claim must be taken seriously: millions of people voted illegally in the presidential election. This entails that the election’s integrity was grossly violated and hence illegitimate. Thus, by Trump’s own claims about the election, he is not the legitimate president and the election would need to be redone with proper safeguards to keep those millions from voting illegally. So, Trump would seem to be in a dilemma: either he is lying about the election and thus unfit or he is telling the truth and is not a legitimately elected president. Either way undermines him.

It could be countered that while the Republicans allege voter fraud and that Trump claimed millions voted illegally, the election was legitimate because the fraud and illegal voting was all for Hillary and she lost. That is, the electoral system’s integrity has been violated but it did not matter because Trump won. On the one hand, this does have some appeal. To use an analogy, think of a Tour de France in which the officials allow bikers to get away with doping, but the winner is drug free. In that case, the race would be a mess, but the winner would still be legitimate—all the cheating was done by others and they won despite the cheating. On the other hand, there is the obvious concern that if such widespread fraud and illegal voting occurred, then it might well have resulted in Trump’s electoral college victory. Going back to the Tour de France analogy, if the winner claimed that the competition was doping but they were clean and still won, despite the testing system being broken, then there would be some serious doubts about their claim. After all, if the system is broken and they were competing against cheaters, then it is worth considering that their victory was the result of cheating. But, perhaps Trump has proof that all (or most) of the fraud and illegal voting was for Hillary. In this case, he should certainly have evidence showing how all this occurred and evidence sufficient to convict individual voters. As such, arrests and significant alterations to the election system should occur soon. Unless, of course, Trump and the Republicans are simply lying about voter fraud and millions of illegals voting. In which case, they need to stop using the specter of voter fraud to justify their attempts to restrict access to voting. They cannot have it both ways: either voter fraud is real and Trump is illegitimate because the system lacks integrity or the claim of significant voting fraud is a lie.

 

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