Wednesday, July 22

Many of you probably saw clips of Trump’s spectacularly dumb speech last week where he continued to push debunked conspiracies about the 2020 election. If you thought it was a big nothingburger — you’re not alone. A lot of MAGA devotees and followers of prominent election deniers also thought the speech was a letdown — and they’re crashing out about it.

Also in this week’s Eye On The Right: Maryland’s GOP gubernatorial candidate Dan Cox is trying to downplay his election denier past… kind of; and, as always, a dispatch from the twilight zone.

Thanks for reading.

Matt Cohen, Senior Reporter

In today’s edition:

➤ All the lies Trump pushed in his big election speech

➤ What did Dan Cox say?

Election denial leaders cheered Trump’s primetime address. But to the rank and file, it was a huge letdown

In a primetime address last week, Trump said China obtained 220 million U.S. voter files and accused intelligence officials — aka the “Deep State” — of concealing election threats. And he suggested electronic voting systems had previously been compromised. It was all, of course, BS and a mishmash of previously disclosed intelligence and debunked claims.

Of course, election deniers — who’ve spent the last six years spewing conspiracy theories and making false promises that people will be held accountable — celebrated the speech as a watershed moment for their movement of lies.

“This is the largest foreign involvement in US elections in our history,” the anti-voting lawyer Cleta Mitchell — who played a key role in Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 vote in Georgia — said. “A fairly earth-shattering bit of news.”
“Trump Just EXPOSED Massive Election FRAUD on LIVE TV — This Just Changed EVERYTHING,” said right-wing influencer Benny Johnson.
“Registration is the foundation of the fraud,” anti-voting activist Seth Keshel posted on X after Trump’s speech.

But what did their devoted followers think of Trump’s primetime revelation? After years of hearing the same old story, they weren’t as stoked.

Without any arrests or action by the Trump administration, many of them seemed skeptical of the claims altogether.

“No names, no arrest and no action,” responded one of Mitchell’s followers. “Not even a trade embargo threat. Just accusations?”
“I agree, but if there are no arrests and no one goes to jail it means nothing!!!!!,” one X user said in response to Johnson’s post.
“This is such a waste of primetime bully pulpit,” one of Keshel’s followers said in response to his post. “THEY HAVE THE EVIDENCE!... I'm so frustrated. 6 years later and we're still talking about vulnerabilities.”

Even though Trump didn’t actually allege that the 2020 election was stolen from him, nor claim that voting machines flipped Republican votes to Democratic ones — a popular conspiracy among election deniers — some still believe his administration will release new evidence to vindicate their false claims.

“They say no votes were changed,” convicted election denier Tina Peters said. “Stay tuned more to come…”

➤ More on the debunked lies Trump pushed

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Maryland’s GOP gubernatorial candidate tries, fails to soften his election denier views

Dan Cox, the Republican candidate in Maryland’s gubernatorial race, was interviewed last week by a local radio station and was grilled about his election denier views.

Cox’s history of spreading false claims about the 2020 election is well documented: He refused to accept President Joe Biden’s victory and called for a “forensic audit” of the state’s vote (bear in mind, Biden won the state by 30 points). Cox also called former Vice President Mike Pence a “traitor” for certifying Biden’s victory, and he arranged for buses of MAGA supporters to go to the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

But when Cox was asked point blank last week if he was an election denier, he danced around it:

“I am not an expert on elections, and I’ve gotten pegged with saying I’m a denier,” Cox said. “I’m actually a supporter of the data. And you’ll notice that I conceded. In my race, I conceded. And you’ll notice that in the 2020 election, even though I got attacked because I questioned Georgia, I called the president. You can look this up in the press. I called the president — President Biden. Why? Because he was the president.”
That’s a far different tune to the one Cox sang when he campaigned for governor in 2022 — a race he lost to Maryland’s current Gov. Wes Moore (D): “Trump is right,” Cox said about the 2020 election. “There were serious problems. We’re still seeing it happen today. And we need to get to the bottom of that.”

Still, pressed last week on whether he thinks Biden legitimately won the election, Cox continued to hedge his bets.

“I think he probably did… he was certified to be the winner,” he said. “But again, I don’t know what the DOJ is saying. And I’m not going to get into that.”

Notes from the Twilight Zone

The GOP’s latest gambit to push the SAVE America Act? Olive Garden.
Right-wing commentator David Freeman — who goes by the online alias Gunther Eagleman — argued with Grok about whether the 2020 election was stolen.
“It is stunning to read today the drivel and nonsense from the leftwing media outlets, with always the most idiotic coming from Democracy Docket,” Cleta Mitchell wrote in a painfully long social media rant after Trump’s speech. This meme is our response:

Conspiracists fight! Emerald Robinson — a far-right commentator with LindellTV — doesn’t trust Trump’s election fraud findings because the report came from John Solomon, another far-right media figure. Robinson thinks Solomon is a CIA plant.
Sarah Palin has a problem with the term “election deniers.”