
President Donald Trump has claimed his primetime speech from the Oval Office Thursday alleging foreign interference in recent U.S. elections drew “great reviews” and a “big audience,” despite also complaining about its not being aired live on several major networks.
The president accused China of meddling in the 2020 vote to ensure his defeat to Joe Biden, suggesting Beijing may have been involved in the “manufacture of illegal ballots” and paid journalists to write negative stories about him.
He also claimed that “deep state” actors within the U.S. intelligence community had withheld crucial information from his daily briefings, all without providing substantial evidence to support his accusations.
The White House did publish a tranche of newly-declassified documents to help Trump make his case, but at least one showed he was the beneficiary of election hacking by Russia, not the victim.
Former national security officials and Democrats have since said his speech was filled with falsehoods and exaggerations, with California Gov. Gavin Newsom calling it “the ramblings of a mad king.”
China’s Foreign Ministry has also responded, saying Trump’s allegations have no basis in fact and reiterating that it never interferes in other state’s affairs.
Read MoreWhat do Trump’s declassified election conspiracy documents show – and how much was known already?
‘The ramblings of a mad king:’ Gavin Newsom leads scornful Democratic reaction to Trump speech
Dem senator says she fears Trump may send troops to seize ballots during midterm elections
Trump today
- Donald Trump hails 'great reviews' for speech not aired live on three major networks
- Trump outlines sprawling election hacking plot in primetime TV address
- President claims ‘deep state’ actors within his own government covered up meddling
- China reject's Trump's allegations and denies interference
- ‘The ramblings of a mad king:’ Newsom leads Democratic attacks on Trump speech
Donald Trump alleges sprawling Chinese election hacking plot in primetime address
09:05 , Joe SommerladWith 109 days remaining until voters decide the balance of power in the next Congress, President Donald Trump used a rare primetime TV address to accuse unnamed national security officials of hiding information about the security of America’s elections and alleged Chinese efforts to interfere in the election he lost nearly six years ago.
Speaking from the East Room of the White House, Trump said he was releasing “critical intelligence” showing “shocking vulnerabilities” in America’s election system in a bid to pressure the current Republican-led Congress to pass partisan voting restriction legislation he has deemed essential to helping his party retain control of the House and Senate.
Offering no evidence, the president claimed American elections are vulnerable “to hacking, exploitation, and foreign interference” and accused the People’s Republic of China of carrying out “the largest compromise of election data in history” by acquiring election data – much of which is commercially available for purchase by political campaigns and other interested parties.
“They wanted to just make you sound like your president wasn't so hot, when actually your president has done a great job, and they did everything possible to do exactly that,” he said.
China’s Foreign Ministry has since responded by saying Trump’s allegations have no factual basis, reiterating that the country adheres to the principle of non-intervention in other state’s affairs and has no interest in influencing U.S. elections.
Andrew Feinberg has the story.
Trump claims deep state plot’ covered up China efforts to ‘undermine’ 2020 election
Analysis: Trump accusing China of conspiracy is not mad – it’s worse than that
16:00 , Joe SommerladThe president’s latest attack on Beijing and the U.S. ‘deep state’ is a sign that he’s planning to prepare for the worst in America’s November elections, writes our world affairs editor Sam Kiley.
Trump accusing China of conspiracy is not mad - it’s worse than that
Marjorie Taylor Greene asks: ‘Who rigged the 2024 election?’
15:35 , Joe SommerladThe former Georgia Republican representative continues to be a thorn in Trump’s side, calling his big speech: “Just a big shiny object for MAGA to distract them away from the Iran War, Epstein files, and massive failure to deliver campaign promises.”
If the Russians rigged the 2016 election and China rigged the 2020 election, who rigged the 2024 election??
— Former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@FmrRepMTG) July 17, 2026
And why won’t both parties, who both say voting machines can be hacked and votes flipped, get rid of voting machines?
And how absurd it is that all the people now…
She also argues that the foreign power currently seeking to influence American politics is Israel.
The foreign influence we are experiencing comes from Israel and their donors.
— Former Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@FmrRepMTG) July 17, 2026
And Trump, his admin, and Republicans are the ones controlled by a foreign government.
Which is why they pulled America into senseless a war with Iran that the American people do not support.
White House already recruiting lawyers in anticipation of Democrat majority after midterms: report
15:15 , Joe SommerladWhile Republicans are publicly expressing confidence about their chances in November, the administration is quietly bracing for the opposition flipping the House of Representatives and launching fresh investigations and perhaps even a historic third impeachment probe, according to Bloomberg.
News: While Republicans express public confidence about the midterms, the Trump administration is already quietly staffing up in preparation for a potential Democratic flip of the House.
— Mica Soellner (@MicaSoellnerDC) July 17, 2026
The WH is preparing for a potential impeachment inquiry, how to response to subpoenas etc. https://t.co/G9LI5dKM1R
Declassified document released to support Trump’s claims shows Russia tried to interfere on his behalf in 2020
14:55 , Joe SommerladOne of the newly-declassified documents posted on the White House website last night to support the president’s claims about foreign interference in past elections actually suggests that he was the beneficiary of such an attempt by the Kremlin, not the victim.
This is really incredible. Docs released by Trump tonight confirm RUSSIA tried to spread claims Biden was engaged in criminal activity vis-a-vis Burisma and that it advanced those narratives "with US officials" and planed a "high-profile corruption scandal... at the peak of the… pic.twitter.com/BUXEYEGnKs
— Sam Stein (@samstein) July 17, 2026
The document in question comes from a National Intelligence Council assessment dated August 19, 2020 and states:
“President Putin and senior Russian officials are overseeing efforts by proxies – [REDACTED] – to spread claims about former Vice President Biden as well as Ukrainian politicians and alleged Ukrainian influence in the 2016 US election. These claims include that when the former Vice President was in office, he engaged in criminal activity in his dealings with Ukraine and individuals tied to Ukrainian energy firm Burisma. Derkach, Kilimnik, and other proxy actors affiliated with the Russian Government are advancing such initiatives with US officials and other prominent persons as well as online, including through personal interactions and audio and documentary film releases via US and Ukrainian media outlets.
“These figures are conspiring to intensify their efforts as the election approaches to orchestrate a high-profile corruption scandal implicating former Vice President Biden and the Democratic Party at the peak of the 2020 US presidential campaign. Their aim is to defeat the former Vice President and ensure the President’s victory. Some of these proxy actors anticipate that Ukraine themed narratives about Democratic corruption will play a decisive role in the election and that US persons are key to propagating these narratives.”
It’s hard to beat California Rep. Ted Lieu’s one-word reaction here:
— Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) July 17, 2026
Gavin Newsom leads scornful Democratic reaction to Trump speech
14:35 , Joe SommerladHere’s a look back at how the likes of Newsom, Kamala Harris, Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries responded to the president’s “election interference” address last night.
‘The ramblings of a mad king:’ Gavin Newsom leads scornful reaction to Trump speech
Trump calls for NBC and ABC to have their licenses revoked for not airing his ‘election interference’ speech
14:15 , Joe SommerladIn case you missed this earlier, the president again threatened the free press last night – this time for not airing his address live, although ABC and NBC did make it available via their streaming platforms.
The president has repeatedly railed against news outlets over stories he doesn’t like and threatened to revoke broadcasters’ licenses for coverage he deems unfair since returning to the White House.
Earlier this year, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr threatened to start revoking licenses in response to Trump’s complaints about media coverage of his war with Iran.
Rhian Lubin reports.
Trump calls for NBC and ABC to have licenses revoked for not airing his speech
Trump claims speech drew ‘great reviews and ‘big audience’
13:55 , Joe SommerladHere’s the latest from the president on Truth Social this morning:
“Great reviews on speech last night. Big audience. Pass THE SAVE AMERICA ACT!!! Thank you!”
Trump doesn’t cite any specific reviews (and clearly didn’t see Lawrence O’Donnell last night), nor a source for his claim about viewing figures – remember it was not even aired on ABC or NBC and the professional Fox-watchers report back that it was barely covered there either.
Fox spent little over 5 minutes on Trump’s speech and then shifted back to Iran. pic.twitter.com/JyzMYLYXFD
— Acyn (@Acyn) July 17, 2026
incredible -- more than two hours into this morning's Fox & Friends, "fraud" has not been mentioned a single time and hosts haven't discussed Trump's big primetime speech at all. They have 787 million reasons to ignore it.
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 17, 2026
‘I hope he gets the help he needs,’ says Omar
13:35 , Joe SommerladHere’s some more opposition reaction, this time from the outspoken Minnesota congresswoman, another person already in Trump’s little black book.
I hope he gets the help he so desperately needs.
— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) July 17, 2026
This is just pathetic and deranged. https://t.co/og70KjodkM
Acosta says Trump’s 2020 election defeat was because of botched pandemic response, not vote-rigging
13:10 , Joe SommerladFormer CNN journalist Jim Acosta, a long-time enemy of the president’s who recently infuriated the White House with a report on the troubled makeover of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, said the reason Trump lost the vote to Joe Biden six years was not because of election fraud but because he failed to lead the country through Covid-19.
Here he is with a reminder of one of Trump’s wildest lines from that dark time.
Trump lost the 2020 election in large part because the voters believed he botched the response to Covid. Time and again, Trump said bonkers stuff like this. I was on the air that evening reporting that Americans should not take their health advice from the president. https://t.co/fjZKpSqg3G
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) July 16, 2026
‘A demented 25-minute exhibition of political pornography’
12:45 , Joe SommerladThat’s how an incensed Lawrence O’Donnell described Trump’s broadcast on MS NOW’s The Last Word, also calling it “deeply sick” and likening it to Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell’s “proof of life” photograph from his hospital bed earlier this week, calling it a “proof of dementia video.”
O’Donnell also laid into the president for attempting to pressure Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger into “finding” him additional during the 2020 vote count.
”There’s no American who has tried to cheatand interfere in our elections in a bigger way than Donald Trump himself,” he fumed.
It was quite a dressing-down and began with this assault on Trump’s speechwriters:
🚨HOLY SHIT: Lawrence O’Donnell just EVISCERATED “deeply sick” Donald Trump and his speech in the BEST way possible:
— CALL TO ACTIVISM (@CalltoActivism) July 17, 2026
“He actually said the words, and he was reading this from a teleprompter: ‘We had transgender for everybody.’ So I guess that was, what? Donald Trump's way of… pic.twitter.com/MLK4HRJNZo
Trump’s speech ‘sounded more like a spy novel,’ says CNN analyst
12:20 , Joe SommerladInterviewed by Kaitlan Collins on The Source last night, the network’s analyst John King characterized the speech as “ominous” and observed that the allegations against foreign powers made by Trump “sounded more like a spy novel.”
Summing up the president’s remarks, King said: “He focused mostly on China. And he said he was releasing all of these new documents tonight that were going to prove more things about China, he says, trying to get voter roll information, trying to learn about how to pry into voting machines and voting systems.
“He never directly connected any of that to changing an election result. That’s important. I don’t have the documents in front of me. We’ll see if they get you there. But the president never did.”
“The only specific claim of actually rigging or changing an election result the president made,” King noted, was when he accused China of rigging a vote in Venezuela on behalf of Nicolas Maduro.
The pundit said Trump had been playing his “greatest hits” and admitted he had never heard a presidential address like it.
“It is impossible now in the Donald Trump era to have an adult conversation about a very legitimate issue,” King concluded.
“It would be nice if Democrats and Republicans could get together, as the president said at one point, why can’t we do this on a bipartisan basis?
“Well, he’s the reason they can’t do some of it on a bipartisan basis because he keeps telling Democrats they’re crooks and they stole elections.”
Here he is recapping the “actual facts” of the 2020 U.S. presidential election as we know them:
With President Trump's fixation on his 2020 election loss and continued claims of a rigged election, CNN's John King revisits the actual facts of the matter. pic.twitter.com/776Nw6n0du
— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) July 17, 2026
Democrat says she fears Trump could send in troops to seize midterms ballots
12:00 , Joe SommerladOn MS NOW’s The Last Word last night, Michigan Sen. Elissa Slotkin told anchor Lawrence O'Donnell she now feared Trump would attempt to send in the U.S. military to seize ballots because he is “willing to really do anything to win.”
Owen Scott has more.
Dem senator fears Trump may send troops to seize ballots in midterms elections
What do Trump’s declassified election conspiracy documents show – and how much was known already?
11:35 , Joe SommerladDonald Trump has spent more than a decade spreading false and inflated claims about election outcomes and how the nation’s elections are run. His primetime address on Thursday was no exception.
The president alleged “shocking vulnerabilities in election infrastructure” and claimed our “election system” is “dangerously” exposed to “hacking, exploitation and foreign interference.”
But it appears much of the newly declassified material he announced Thursday evening echoes or reinterprets previously disclosed information that was already known to intelligence officials, including during his first administration.
Importantly, nothing in the materials supports any allegations that any votes were manipulated by fraud or foreign actors to have changed election outcomes.
Election officials and voting rights advocates fear the president’s remarks, which he says are meant to protect elections, will instead continue to sow deep distrust in their legitimacy to serve his own interests.
Alex Woodward takes a closer look.
What Trump said about election security — and what we already know
Fox News issues disclaimer over Trump voting machine conspiracy – three years after losing $787M defamation case
11:10 , Joe SommerladThe conservative network did air the president’s speech last night and wisely chose to tread carefully in its treatment of his remarks, given the trouble it encountered in the aftermath of the 2020 vote.
"Fox News has not seen the evidence yet and is not in a position to evaluate the accuracy of the president's statement and claims" pic.twitter.com/AOpcPjyNze
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 17, 2026
Watch: Trump says US networks not airing his speech should have their licenses revoked
10:45 , Joe SommerladThe president attacked ABC and NBC last night for declining to broadcast his address, saying in the course of it: “They and others in the media are part of a plot. They want to continue this fraud for whatever reason.
“Fraud like this should mean a revocation of their licences.”
Trump insider admits that no votes were flipped in the last three elections
10:20 , Joe SommerladThese remarks from John Solomon, a conservative journalist who has been chosen to lead Trump’s task force on declassifying documents, are not exactly a ringing endorsement of the claims the president made last night.
Given that Trump is a man who prizes unquestioning loyalty above all things, he is likely to be displeased.
At the end of this clip, John Solomon, who Trump hired at the White House to investigate elections, admits the intelligence does not show the 2020 election was rigged as Trump claims https://t.co/AU6uEVBMad
— Aidan McLaughlin (@aidnmclaughlin) July 17, 2026
White House documents show China 'did not intend' to hack election
09:55 , Josh MarcusTrump has a long history of making false claims about elections and files released by his own White House suggest he may once again be exaggerating.
One document, for instance, notes that “Beijing did not intend to try to affect the election,” directly contradicting Trump’s claims last night that China sought to steal the vote and tank his candidacy.
one of the supposedly damning docs the White House released tonight says Russia tried to undermine BIDEN.
— Catherine Rampell (@crampell) July 17, 2026
Also says China "prefers that President Trump be defeated" but actually "Beijing did not intend to try to affect the election" (!) pic.twitter.com/Bs5hTsf6iz
‘The ramblings of a mad king:’ Newsom leads Democratic attacks on Trump speech
09:30 , Joe SommerladHere’s just a taste of the opposition indignation about the president’s address last night, with the California governor setting the tone.
Tonight, America watched the ramblings of a mad king.
— Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) July 17, 2026
Donald Trump’s address was not about the last election — it was THIS one.
Before a single vote has been cast, he’s already laying the groundwork to rig this election and convince YOU not to trust the results if they don’t go…
This president sadly wallows in grievance, vengeance, and conspiracy while Americans want their leaders to boldly tackle persistent inflation, expensive groceries, rising gas prices, and terrible cuts to affordable healthcare.
— Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) July 17, 2026
We Democrats are engaged in doing exactly that, and…
The president is scared of your power, and he wants you to believe your vote does not matter.
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) July 17, 2026
He wants you to lose confidence in our electoral system so you stay home this November. He knows how discontent the American people are, and he wants to make sure that you do not vote.…
Donald Trump is a feeble, unhinged conspiracy-peddling 80-year old failed President.
— Hakeem Jeffries (@RepJeffries) July 17, 2026
The economy is a disaster under this guy and the American people know it.
Pathetic.
Tonight I heard a failed and desperate president who as war spirals and prices rise is as always focused on his grievances, his shame, and above all his fear of the accountability that will come with defeat.
— Jon Ossoff (@ossoff) July 17, 2026
I also heard a president signaling his unmistakable intent to attack…
China hits back at Trump’s election hacking allegations
08:45 , Joe SommerladResponding to the president’s primetime attack last night, China’s Foreign Ministry has just said the allegations have no factual basis.
It adds that Beijing adheres to the principle of non-intervention in other state’s affairs and has no interest in influencing U.S. elections.
Earlier, the Chinese Embassy in Washington told Reuters that China “has never and will never interfere in the presidential elections.”
Democratic senator worries Trump speech is prelude to military at polls
08:30 , Josh MarcusPresident Trump’s elections speech, which alleged widespread vulnerabilities in the U.S. voting system, could be just the beginning, according to one Democratic senator.
Sen. Elissa Slotkin fears the president’s repeated claims that elections are unsafe could be a prelude to sending the military to the polls, which could intimidate voters or local officials.
“The president refuses to rule out, as does his cabinet, sending in uniformed military,” Slotkin, a former CIA analyst, told MS Now of the possibility, which has inspired her to propose legislation barring such a step.
“What if they don’t have a warrant?” she added. “These are some really scary kind of tabletop exercises [and] things that we’re having here because the president has made clear this is not a joke to him…He’s willing to really do anything to ‘win’ in November.”
Conservative journalist helping Trump hunt for conspiracies acknowledges 'zero evidence' foreign power turned 2020 race
07:45 , Josh MarcusA conservative journalist just inadvertently punctured a hole in President Trump’s claims that documents show a sprawling Chinese conspiracy to steal American elections.
“All I can acknowledge is what the intelligence shows,” Just the News founder John Solomon, who is part of a White House elections task force on the subject, told MS Now on Thursday. “I only know the intelligence community has zero evidence that a foreign power flipped a vote in 2020, ‘22, and ‘24.”
“I’m still researching,” he added.
DHS appears to soften claims about thousands of illegally registered non-citizen voters
07:00 , Josh MarcusThe White House claims it has discovered evidence of hundreds of thousands of non-citizens who are illegally registered to vote, part of a series of explosive election-related claims it has made alongside President Trump’s speech tonight.
“According to a D.H.S. review of state voter rolls and public records, they identified approximately 278,000 non-citizens who are registered to vote in federal elections,” reads a White House webpage detailing the allegations. “Since Democrat states refused to share their voter files, the real number is actually much higher—yet even this limited analysis found more than a quarter of a million foreigners illegally registered to vote.”
Meanwhile, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin has been a bit more measured, perhaps wary of how his predecessor was slammed for making unfounded claims about immigration issues.
On X, he wrote that DHS “has identified over 250,000 potential non-citizens illegally registered to vote in just 4 U.S. states.”
What the administration has not shown, however, is that wrongly registered people have actually voted en masse or changed the outcome of elections.
Countless reviews of the 2020 election have shown that the results were valid, and actual voter fraud is an extremely rare crime that has not been shown to sway elections.
Read the full files from Trump's 2020 election info dump
06:15 , Josh MarcusThe Independent is actively reviewing the trove of documents the Trump administration released on Thursday to support its claims of wide-ranging vulnerabilities in U.S. election systems and a 2020 interference campaign by China.
If you want to take a look for yourself, here’s a link to the White House portal with the documents.
MAGA influencer wants Trump to blast China with tariffs over 2020 claims
05:30 , Josh MarcusDemocrats and Republicans alike are asking the same question right now: If China really did compromise 2020 elections, as President Trump claims, what is the White House going to do about it?
One answer, according to right-wing influencer and conspiracy theorist Jack Posobiec, is to launch stepped-up tariffs on Beijing.
“This was an attack on our democracy,” Posobiec told former Trump adviser Steve Bannon in an interview on Thursday. “This was the greatest attack on our republic since 9/11, and it was done so by the Chinese Communist Party. And so as such, we should start by seeing an immediate ratchet up to 100 percent, 1000 percent on all Chinese goods.”
“That should happen tomorrow,” he added. “President Trump drops that down, drops the hammer on the Chinese Communist Party, then you watch how fast things change.”
Trump claims deep state plot’ covered up China efforts to ‘undermine’ 2020 election
What do Trump’s declassified election conspiracy documents show — and how much was known already?
04:36 , Josh MarcusPresident Donald Trump has spent more than a decade spreading false and inflated claims about election outcomes and how the nation’s elections are run. His primetime address on Thursday was no exception.
The president alleged “shocking vulnerabilities in election infrastructure” and claimed our “election system” is “dangerously” exposed to “hacking, exploitation and foreign interference.”
But it appears much of the newly declassified material he announced Thursday evening echoes or reinterprets previously disclosed information that was already known to intelligence officials, including during his first administration.
Importantly, nothing in the materials supports any allegations that any votes were manipulated by fraud or foreign actors to have changed election outcomes.
Election officials and voting rights advocates fear the president’s remarks, which he says are meant to protect elections, will instead continue to sow deep distrust in their legitimacy to serve his own interests.
Alex Woodward has the story.
What Trump said about election security — and what we already know
News networks offer disclaimers on explosive Trump speech
04:00 , Josh MarcusNo one wants a multi-million dollar defamation suit on their hands.
As news networks sought to cover President Trump’s major elections speech tonight, they issued careful disclaimers about the Republican’s statements.
After all, 2020 election conspiracies on air helped lead to Fox News paying out a whopping $787 million in a defamation suit.
So, as the big networks again had to wade into the waters of 2020 election info, they tread carefully.
On CBS News, anchor Tony Dokoupil acknowledged the president’s penchant for false claims about the election.
”Much of what the president had said on this topic has been false,” Dokoupil said. “Most notably, of course, the claim that he won the 2020 election, when of course he did not.”
Fox News, meanwhile, had words of caution about Trump’s claims that voting machines could have major vulnerabilities.
"Fox News has not seen that evidence yet [and] is not in a position to evaluate the accuracy of the president's statement and claims,” one anchor said.
Former State Department official questions lack of action steps after Trump alleges China conspiracy
03:25 , Josh MarcusPresident Trump’s speech tonight was heavy on accusations and light on action, according to Biden administration State Department official Matthew Miller.
“So the president has supposedly just unveiled a massive plot by China to interfere in our elections, and he’s going to do nothing to China in response?” Miller wrote on X. “No sanctions, no countermeasures? Not even a phone call to his buddy Xi? Come on.”
Former Defense and CIA chief says Trump speech full of 'disproven claims'
03:21 , Josh MarcusLeon Panetta, who previously held roles as head of the CIA and Department of Defense, claims Donald Trump’s speech tonight was full of speculation and exaggeration.
“As someone who spent my career protecting America’s national security, I know the difference between legitimate security threats and political narratives,” Panetta said in a statement along with the group Issue One. “Our intelligence professionals concluded there was no evidence of cyberattacks altering votes or changing outcomes in the 2020 elections.”
“Recycling disproven claims about an election that took place six years ago doesn’t strengthen our security – it distracts from the real work of protecting the elections ahead,” he added. “It is incumbent upon every elected and administrative official to push back against the president’s lies tonight.”
'Some bulls***': Democratic election officials react to Trump speech
03:15 , Josh MarcusDemocratic election officials reacted with skepticism on Thursday to President Trump’s major elections speech, which appears to have combined a variety of MAGA conspiracy theories with previously disclosed evidence.
“That was some bulls***,” Democratic Association of Secretaries of State (DASS) Chair Cisco Aguilar said in a statement.
PHOTOS: Trump officials look on as president gives conspiratorial 2020 elections speech
02:55 , Josh MarcusTrump claims ‘deep state’ actors in his own government covered up Chinese ‘election interference’
02:51 , Josh MarcusWith 110 days remaining until voters decide the balance of power in the next Congress, Donald Trump used a rare prime-time address to accuse unnamed national security officials of hiding information about the security of America’s elections and alleged Chinese efforts to interfere in the election he lost nearly six years ago.
Speaking from the East Room of the White House, Trump said he was releasing “critical intelligence” showing “shocking vulnerabilities” in America’s election system in a bid to pressure the current Republican-led Congress to pass partisan voting restriction legislation he has deemed essential to helping his party retain control of the House and Senate.
Citing no evidence, the president claimed American elections are vulnerable “to hacking, exploitation, and foreign interference” and accused the People’s Republic of China of carrying out “the largest compromise of election data in history” by acquiring election data — much of which is commercially available for purchase by political campaigns and other interested parties.
“They wanted to just make you sound like your president wasn't so hot, when actually your president has done a great job, and they did everything possible to do exactly that,” he said.
Andrew Feinberg has the story:
Trump claims ‘deep state’ actors in covered up Chinese ‘election interference’
Trump fuels MAGA conspiracy theory about Venezuela in elections speech
02:50 , Josh MarcusAs expected, President Donald Trump’s speech included references to alleged election vulnerabilities in Venezuela, which MAGA allies of the president have alleged spilled into U.S. elections.
“Today, we are releasing documents that show the CIA obtained reporting of a specific plot to do a big number in favor of the corrupt Maduro regime in Venezuela,” Trump said.
“This reporting included precise details about methods to…digitally alter vote totals in ways that could not be detected even with an audit, no matter how deep they went.”
Here’s more on the GOP Venezuela angle, courtesy of Alex Woodward, who had this look at the dubious theory ahead of Trump’s speech.
Is Trump getting his 2020 election revenge against Venezuela?
Trump alleges info about Chinese election attacks was kept out of presidential briefings
02:28 , Josh Marcus“Dozens of significant CIA and NSA reports about China's election targeting were kept out of the presidential briefing,” Trump claimed. “These were briefings I would get almost every day. Everything was kept out.”
Trump calls on FBI to revive alleged 2020 investigation about Michigan
02:27 , Josh MarcusThe president said he is calling on federal law enforcement to revive an alleged 2020 investigation into voter fraud in 2020 in Michigan.
“The documents state that some canvassers admitted to FBI agents that they signed voter registration forms in other people's names, submitted fraudulent registration for people who did not exist, and received gift cards tied to their number of applications that they produced,” Trump claimed. “In other words, it was pay, play, and cheat. The FBI agents working on the case believe that crimes were committed, yet the Biden Department of Justice slow-walked the investigation and killed it.”
Trump claims security officials underplayed threat of election vulnerabilities
02:20 , Josh MarcusThe president alleges Americans have been misled by U.S. officials about the extent of vulnerabilities in U.S. election infrastructure.
“Americans were blatantly lied to about the security of our election infrastructure, including electronic voting machines and ballot counting systems,” he said.
Trump claims China carried out 'stunning' election scheme beginning in 2020
02:17 , Josh MarcusIn a highly anticipated Thursday night speech, President Donald Trump accused China of carrying out “the largest compromise of election data in history” beginning with the 2020 election.
The scheme allegedly netted China 220 million files about U.S. voters.
The Republican further claimed U.S. officials concealed the nature of the threat from him.
Catch up: What the intel community has previously said about 2020 election meddling
02:15 , Josh Marcus
Report shows Russia attempted to influence 2020 election by ‘supporting’ Trump

