The January 2 one-hour phone call by President Trump demanding the Georgia Secretary of State to find 11,780 votes so Trump could carry Georgia is an abuse of his office and federal law (52 US Code section 20511 (2)(B). Georgia’s Secretary of State calmly explained to Mr. Trump that they hand recounted their votes twice on top of the original tally and Vice President Biden Still won by 11,779 votes.

Ever living in a parallel delusional universe, the President actually said on tape “as you know we won every single state” and won Georgia by “hundreds of thousands of votes.” His insanity even led him to say “we won the House” which must be news to Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Check the tape for these quotes if you doubt them. They aren’t fake news.

Trump’s pathetic legal staff never explained to him that election night is part of a process, not the end of one. With 100,000,000 absentee and early voters in November there would have to be a delay in tallying that wall of votes that could not be completed on election night. That was not fraud, but merely the result of COVID forcing people not to all show up on election day and stand in a line with idiots who do not wear masks to protect their fellow citizens from a disease that will kill at least half a million of us. It was all legal, but made the final count a delayed one, not a fraudulent one.

The delusion of Trumpers that millions of his votes were stolen while tons of other Republicans won is absurd. How could anyone with a pulse think that a guy that polled at 43% for four years won by more than 50% and it was stolen from him by Republicans running Georgia and Arizona? How?

His encouragement of the grand conspiracy led directly to the violent coup attempt at the Capital on Wednesday. Republicans need to forcefully support our democracy and not further humor the fascist Trump QAnon wing of our party.

Now just imagine the Republican pushback that would occur if a Democratic President lost New Hampshire by 11,779 votes and, after recounts, called up Secretary of State Bill Gardner, and said Bill “I just want 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.” Would there be Republican hue and cry if that president said to Bill Gardner “there’s nothing wrong with saying that…you’ve recalculated.” Or how about adding that he should want Gardner to do that because “you’re a Democrat.”

The Al Baldasaro-Lewandowski conspiracy-wing of the GOP would be shouting “treason” and calling for that president to be “locked up” for interfering win our State’s election certification. But when it is Trump trying to flip Georgia after its votes were certified their silence is a reflection of a lack of consistent principle when it comes to the states’ rights to handle their own elections.

When they are young, we teach our children that you can’t be a sore loser when a Little League game goes against you. We also teach in civics classes that our elections are always followed by a peaceful transfer of power in a democracy if the person in office loses a race. We don’t teach them to make up totally unsupported charges of massive fraud to explain their loss.

The stability of our country cannot be sustained if sore losers set the standard for how we handle defeat. After his frivolous lawsuit attempting to give Vice President Mike Pence the power to overturn the Electoral College’s 306 to 232 vote was dismissed on January 1, Congressman Louie Gohmert actually said the ruling means “you gotta go to the streets and be as violent as Antifa.” And his case was tossed by a federal judge appointed by none other than Donald Trump.

Reinforcing the absurdity of Gohmert’s suit, his lawyer, Lin Wood, said Vice President Mike Pence should “face execution by firing squad for treason” if he doesn’t overturn the results of the Electoral College vote.

I guess Trump, Gohmert and Wood never played in the Little League. The lessons of threats and violence they learned somewhere else are an embarrassment to anyone who believes in the conservative values upon which our nation was built. All Republicans should reject their outrageous words and Trump’s attempt at a coup if they are true patriots. End the madness now.

Chuck Douglas is a former State Supreme Court Justice, Republican Congressman from New Hampshire, and retired Army Guard colonel.

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