Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich seemingly demanded on Thursday night that Attorney General Bill Barr use federal agents to arrest election workers in Pennsylvania and that election results in the state should be tossed.
With former Vice President Joe Biden getting closer to an electoral victory as mail-in votes in Pennsylvania continue to break heavily for him, President Donald Trump threw a televised tantrum on Thursday and doubled down on his baseless claims that the election is being stolen from him and heâs the rightful winner.
âIf you count the legal votes, I easily win. If you count the illegal votes, they can try to steal the election from us,â Trump said. Team Trump, meanwhile, continued to file and threaten lawsuits in states where the president is trailing or could potentially lose.
Fox News host and informal Trump adviser Sean Hannity devoted the bulk of his Thursday night broadcast to proposing a new strategy to the president and his campaign: demand that Pennsylvania, the tipping point state, just re-do its election.
After selling Trump-boosting Sens. Lindsey Graham and Ted Cruz on the idea, the Fox News star then checked in with Gingrich, asking him about the focus of one of the Trump campaignâs recent lawsuits.
âLetâs see. Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, all of them, a lot of them mention partisan observers are permitted to be present when ballots are counted,â Hannity stated. âBut we get report after report that they are not being allowed to observe. Is that a violation of law? And how do you remedy that?â
âMy hope is that President Trump will lead the millions of Americans who understand exactly whatâs going on,â Gingrich fumed. âThe Philadelphia machine is corrupt. The Atlanta machine is corrupt. The machine in Detroit is corrupt. And they are trying to steal the presidency. And we should not allow them to do that.â
âFirst of all, under federal law, we should lock up the people who are breaking the law,â he continued. âYou stop somebody from being an observer, you just broke federal law. Do you hide and put up papers so nobody can see what you're doing? You just broke federal law. You bring in ballots that aren't real? You just broke federal law.â
After calling for poll workers to be locked up over the rightâs latest conspiracy theories about the election, the former speaker wondered aloud if Republicans are âsupposed to surrender,â adding that the specter of Trump losing is âa genuine deep crisis of our survival.â
âSo, what is the answer, now that the law's been violated and observers been kicked out? Doesn't it render the vote illegitimate?â Hannity asked.
âThe first answerâthe first answer is for the attorney. Look, the attorney general this afternoon issued an order that federal agents can carry guns in the pursuit of people who are breaking the law. That's a signal,â Gingrich responded.
The ex-speaker began to call for the president to âcalmly announceâ what should happen to those âcaught attempting to steal votesâ or blocking observers before Hannity interjected, claiming they were running out of time.
âItâs already happened. The votes have already been counted and they didnât have observers. They were kept away,â Hannity exclaimed, reiterating his previous question. (Observers were not kept away. The Trump teamâs lawsuit complained that their poll watchers, which were there from the beginning, werenât allowed to be close enough to observe the ballot counting.)
âYou take them back,â Gingrich exclaimed. âAny precinct, any precinct that we were not able to observe, strip those votes out. Do not count them. Because they are by definition corrupt.â