Michael Flynn Predicts ‘Violence’ Day After Election | EUROtoday

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Michael Flynn, a nationwide safety advisor underneath then-President Donald Trump, ominously predicted election-related violence in a current interview and urged Trump to declare victory earlier than the complete outcomes of the presidential election are identified.

Republicans in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania have blocked efforts to permit for the counting of mail-in ballots earlier than Election Day. As a consequence, election officers in these states don’t count on the ultimate outcomes to be out there shortly.

Nonetheless, throughout an look on the right-wing podcast American Truth Project earlier this month, Flynn stated that if the victor of the election isn’t identified by Nov. 6, the day following Election Day, there could possibly be “violence.”

“I actually think that’ll be a really bad spot, and I feel like people are going to go to those locations where there’s counting, and there could actually be violence, because people are so upset after 2020, and what is very clear, in terms of a fraudulent election in certain states, they’re just not going to put up with it anymore,” he stated. Flynn stated earlier that he was talking about “hypothetical probabilities.”

The interview was flagged by USA Today Thursday. During the identical interview, Flynn famous that Pennsylvania officers don’t count on to have full outcomes out there on election night time — one thing he known as “egregious behavior.” He in contrast the state to Florida, which is understood for counting its ballots shortly.

Flynn — who pleaded responsible to creating false statements to the FBI in 2017, earlier than later trying to withdraw the plea, and who was ultimately pardoned by Trump in late 2020 — has spent the final 4 years crisscrossing the nation, spreading conspiracy theories about election administration and amplifying Trump’s lie that the 2020 election was stolen.

He’s additionally often used violent rhetoric, akin to when he informed InfoWars host Alex Jones in December, “We’re moving towards the sound of the guns here, folks. And the sound of the guns is freedom. We are going to move towards freedom.” Recently, he informed a right-wing Christian viewers that if Trump wins, “the gates of hell, my hell, will be unleashed.

Separately, during the same interview, Flynn said he believed Trump will win a 50-state victory if the election is fair, but that he doesn’t believe Democrats “are going to allow a totally fair election to occur.”

He suggested Trump to declare victory even earlier than he is aware of the complete outcomes.

“If I were Trump, and he was way up, and the polls haven’t closed in Pennsylvania, the polls haven’t closed in Arizona, polls haven’t closed in Wisconsin — I would claim victory that night,” Flynn stated. “When I look back in 2020, he should have claimed victory last night. And let everybody go to bed. Whatever they were going to come up with, just say that’s a bunch of B.S., those are all a bunch of lies.”

In truth, that is precisely what Trump did in 2020, asserting that he’d gained late on election night time and demanding that ballot-counting cease instantly, which might have disenfranchised 1000’s of voters. Days earlier than that election, Trump advisor Steve Bannon revealed that this technique was pre-planned.

“What Trump’s gonna do is just declare victory. Right? He’s gonna declare victory. But that doesn’t mean he’s a winner,” Bannon stated, in keeping with a recording later obtained by Mother Jones. “He’s just gonna say he’s a winner.”

Bannon not too long ago suggested Trump to do the identical factor this yr.

“I am urging President Trump: If the votes come in like it looks like they’re going to come in, he should step up and inform the American citizens of exactly what’s going on and not keep people in the dark like was done in 2020,” Bannon stated at a press convention after being launched from jail this week.

Flynn stated that election officers in different states ought to have the ability to match Florida’s velocity as a result of, he asserted, election officers are capable of depend mail-in ballots “as they’re coming in.”

That’s not true, and it’s one of many primary causes election ends in some states take longer to tally than others: In Pennsylvania, present regulation requires election employees to attend till Election Day to start tabulating mail ballots, even when they arrive early. Wisconsin election officers are additionally barred from counting ballots earlier than Election Day. In truth, election officers in each states aren’t even allowed to start processing ballots — for instance, verifying voters’ signatures and taking ballots out of their envelopes — till Election Day, not to mention really begin tallying votes.

In each states, Republicans blocked efforts to alter these guidelines. In Pennsylvania, state Senate Republicans insisted that any future reforms additionally require voters to current ID every time they vote, which Democrats have rejected on the grounds that ID guidelines make it more durable for marginalized teams to vote. Also, in North Carolina final yr, Republicans instituted a brand new regulation requiring that early ballots solely be counted as soon as polls shut on Election Day.

The overwhelming majority of states have far more liberal guidelines for the early processing and counting of ballots.

Also, whereas it’s true that information retailers – not election officers – predicted Trump would carry Florida in a single day after Election Day 2020, the margin in that state was nowhere close to as shut as in key swing states. Trump finally beat Biden by almost 400,000 votes within the Sunshine State.

USA Today additionally flagged a current remark from Ivan Raiklin, a Flynn affiliate identified for saying he longs for “retribution” towards an inventory of journalists and political figures in one other Trump time period.

Raiklin stated Americans ought to plan to “descend” on election employees if outcomes aren’t introduced by midnight on Election Day, and to livestream “every movement and every breath of every single poll worker,” as a way to “ensure they are motivated to guarantee a free fair and transparent election.”

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Neither Flynn nor Raiklin instantly responded to HuffPost’s request for remark Thursday.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/michael-flynn-results-election-violence_n_6723c2bde4b01f6919d96715