LAS VEGAS, Nev. — Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said Wednesday that “the only thing rigged” about the election is Donald Trump’s “mind,” pushing back on the GOP nominee’s warnings that the election could be stolen from him in November.
“I think the only thing rigged that I’ve seen in this election is [Trump’s] mind,” he said when asked by NBC News about Trump’s allegations. “How would a good American citizen do everything he could to frighten the American people, saying the election's rigged?”
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Reid pointed to comments in recent weeks from election experts and elected officials refuting Trump’s charges of widespread voter fraud, noting that “we have a decentralized system — you can’t [rig] it.” He also charged Trump has said in “code words” that the election fraud is particularly prevalent in minority communities, a reference to Trump’s recent comments, to a largely white audience, that it’s “so important that you watch other communities, because we don’t want this election stolen from us.”
Reid touted the tradition of a peaceful transfer of power throughout American history, but wouldn’t say if he’s concerned that tradition could be broken, as Trump gins up anger among his supporters at the election proceedings. Some of his supporters have warned of an “uprising” if he doesn’t win the election.
Reid noted that in 2000, despite Democrats’ belief that their nominee won the election, when the Supreme Court decided against a recount of the Florida vote and effectively affirmed President George W. Bush as the winner there were “no riots, no broken windows, no tires burning in the streets.”
Asked by NBC News if he expects that to be the outcome of the upcoming election, Reid said only, “I’m just telling you what happens in most countries and didn’t happen in America — you can draw whatever conclusion you want.”