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Tamara Keith:

And this is very similar to language that many Republicans, including Mike Pence, landed on after the 2020 election and before January 6, where they didn't want to go all the way as far as Trump is going and say that the election was stolen, but they wanted to say, well, you should look into it.

And what they're saying here is, well, we will support the results if it's a fair election.

But it's worth noting that former President Trump really only thinks an election is fair if he wins. And I will just remind you that, after 2016, he won, and then he claimed that there was election there was voter fraud in California and New Hampshire because he didn't win those states.

So he is someone who has a very lengthy, proven track record of denying election results. And now you have Republicans out there, mainstream Republicans, creating sort of a permission structure, saying that, if it's fair, then maybe I will support the results. They're not willing to commit in advance.

And that creates a permission structure for mainstream Republican voters to say, well, if they're OK with this, then I can be OK with this.

Continued here:
Tamara Keith and Amy Walter on Republicans rallying around Trump at his trial - PBS NewsHour

House Republicans are pushing legislation to crack down on voting by noncitizens, part of an effort to sow doubts about the election outcome and take aim at immigrants who they say have no business participating in elections in the United States.

They are planning to push through a bill this week that would roll back a Washington, D.C., law allowing noncitizen residents of the nations capital to vote in local elections. And they are pushing legislation that would require states to obtain proof of citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport, in person when registering an individual to vote and require states to remove noncitizens from voter rolls.

Neither is likely to pass the Democratic-led Senate or be signed by President Biden, but both are ways for Republicans to call attention to their false claims of widespread illegal voting by noncitizens.

Former President Donald J. Trump has long claimed in the face of evidence to the contrary that presidential and congressional elections are susceptible to widespread voter fraud and illegal voting by undocumented immigrants who have skewed the outcomes in favor of Democrats a charge that House Republicans have echoed.

Here are the facts about noncitizen voting and the false claims that foreign nationals swing close elections in one partys favor.

There has long been a policy debate in the United States about whether voting rights should be afforded at the municipal level to foreign nationals regardless of immigration status, as most of them pay comparable levels of taxes to U.S. citizens, contribute to their local economies and send their children to local schools.

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Here's Why Republicans Are Focusing on Voting by Noncitizens - The New York Times

As the 2022 elections approached with some Republican Senate candidates on the ropes, Senator Mitch McConnell was already looking ahead to 2024. He saw opportunity in the person of Jim Justice, the popular Republican governor of West Virginia whose term would fortuitously for Mr. McConnell end in 2024.

Here we had a guy who was term-limited and who everybody assumed was going to just go off into the sunset, recounted Mr. McConnell, the Kentucky Republican and minority leader. But he had to-die-for numbers.

Mr. McConnell secretly flew to West Virginia on Oct. 19, 2022. Over lunch at Governor Justices home, he tried to interest him in running for Senate. In April 2023, Mr. Justice announced he would seek the seat held by Senator Joe Manchin III, probably the only Democrat with any chance of winning in super-red West Virginia.

In November, Mr. Manchin announced he would not seek re-election. Earlier this month, Governor Justice won his primary, putting him squarely on track to capture the Senate seat, which would leave Republicans just one seat shy of a majority.

Im pretty sure, barring some intervention, thats No. 50, said Mr. McConnell, referring to the number of seats his party would control if all went according to plan. Democrats would need to hold everything they now have in the 51-to-49 Senate or pick up a Republican seat to stay in the majority next year, he noted. Theyre left with trying to have a perfect score.

Though Mr. McConnell is stepping down from his leadership post in 2025 and is widely expected to retire when his term ends in 2027, he is determined to leave his successor with a majority in the Senate after heading his party in both the minority and the majority over almost 18 years. His personal effort to recruit Governor Justice was a central element of his plan.

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In Twilight of Senate Career, McConnell Sees 2024 Races as Last Hurrah - The New York Times

U.S. Rep. Mike Simpson secured the Republican Party nomination for Idahos congressional district serving south central Idaho, eastern Idaho and most of Boise in his bid for a 14th term.

The Associated Press declared Simpson the winner of the Idaho GOP primary for Idahos 2nd Congressional District at 10:07 p.m. Tuesday.

Simpson had 54% of the votes over two Republican challengers, according to unofficial election results from the Idaho Secretary of States Office. Scott Cleveland, a financial adviser in Eagle and Ada County Republican Party third vice chair, has earned 35.8% of the votes, while 9.5% of votes were for Sean Higgins in Boise, who works in information technology.

Simpson received over 53,000 votes, according to the unofficial results reported by the Idaho Secretary of States Office at 2 a.m. Wednesday.

Tuesdays primary election results wont become official until the State Board of Canvassers certifies the election results. The canvass is scheduled to occur at 11:15 a.m. June 5 at the Mountain America Center in Idaho Falls, Idaho Secretary of State Phil McGrane said.

Simpson, 73, has represented Idaho in Congress since 1999 for 13 terms. U.S. House of Representatives terms are two years.

The first thing you do is listen to your bosses. And the bosses are the voters of the 2nd Congressional District, or all your constituents in the 2nd Congressional District, Simpson told the Idaho Capital Sun in a phone interview Tuesday night.

Sometimes, he said, that means explaining votes to constituents, asking them for advice or having them inform him about how congressional action impacts their business and families.

If Simpson is re-elected to Congress, his top priorities are agriculture reform, security for the southern border and Idaho National Laboratorys continued growth, he told the Sun.

In the November general election, Simpson is set to face Democrat David Roth, Libertarian Todd Corsetti and the winner of the Idaho Constitution Party primary. Party candidate Idaho Law Carta Sierra won the Idaho Constitution Party primary with 51% of votes, or 102 total votes, over Pro-Life, a person formerly known as Marvin Richardson, who received 49% of votes, or 98 votes, according to unofficial Idaho election results.

In Idaho, Republican primary elections often decide major elections. Idaho voters last elected a Democrat to statewide office in 2002. Since 1992, Republicans have held a supermajority in both chambers of the Idaho Legislature.

U.S. Rep. Russ Fulcher, 62, did not face a Republican primary challenger this year in his re-election campaign to represent Idahos 1st Congressional District, which spans southwestern and North Idaho. Democrat Kaylee Peterson, Libertarian Matt Loesby and Constitution Party candidate Brendan J. Gomez have filed as candidates for Fulchers seat. Theyre all set to face off in the November general election.

In 2022, Republican U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo won a fifth term after receiving 59% of votes, defeating Roth and Cleveland, who ran as an independent.

Idahos 2nd Congressional District which U.S. Rep Mike Simpson represents splits Ada County and includes most of Boise, as well as the entire counties of Lemhi, Custer, Elmore, Camas, Blaine, Lincoln, Gooding, Jerome, Minidoka, Twin Falls, Cassia, Butte, Clark, Fremont, Jefferson, Madison, Teton, Bonneville, Bingham, Power, Bannock, Caribou, Oneida, Franklin and Bear Lake.

Idahos 2nd Congressional District is home to roughly 954,000 people, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

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Simpson chairs the House Interior and Environment Subcommittee on Appropriations. He also serves on the House Energy and Water Development Subcommittee and the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education Subcommittee on Appropriations.

One of the most important things is trying to get the ag immigration reform bill that weve worked on for the last couple of terms. And its an important bill to agriculture in Idaho and agriculture across the country, Simpson told the Sun.

Simpson, who has criticized President Joe Bidens border policies, also said securing the southern border is important across the U.S.

I cant believe its as hard to get anything done in that respect as it is, Simpson said. But, we cant have 13 million people, undocumented people, coming across the border every four years and expect to have a country still.

Simpson has touted securing funding for Idaho National Laboratory, a nuclear research lab in eastern Idaho that employed more than 6,000 people last year and is one of Idahos largest employers.

In October 2023, Idahos congressional delegation introduced legislation to block the Lava Ridge Wind Farm, a proposal to place up to 400 turbines in south central Idaho, the Idaho Capital Sun previously reported. Simpson said in a news release in March a federal spending bill Congress passed blocked the out-of-touch project until the Secretary of Interior consults with local elected officials and stakeholders and reports back to Congress, Boise State Public Radio reported.

Simpsons 2021 salmon recovery plan to breach four lower Snake River hydroelectric dams has faced opposition from Idaho Republican elected officials.

Simpson has been a dissenting vote in Idahos congressional delegation on major issues in recent years, including to suspend the federal governments debt ceiling limit in 2023 and being among 35 Republicans who joined Democrats to approve legislation in 2021 to establish a commission to investigate the events of Jan. 6, when protestors stormed the U.S. Capitol building.

Simpson has endorsed former U.S. president Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election. Trump endorsed Simpson in a Sunday post on Truth Social, Trumps social media platform. Simpson wrote in a post on X that he will work with President Trump to stop the flood of illegal immigration at our border and curb the crippling inflation from Bidens failed economic policies.

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Idaho Congressman Mike Simpson wins Republican nomination in re-election campaign Idaho Capital Sun - Idaho Capital Sun

The explanation we heard most often from strategists on the left, right, and center: Biden is unpopular in ways that are largely unique to him, regularly hitting sub-40 marks in approval ratings. And while Trump is still viewed unfavorably, polling also shows voters increasingly rating his presidency better by comparison.

I think this just speaks to the degree that Biden is a weak general election candidate when relatively uninspiring Democratic candidates are outperforming him so consistently across the board, Patrick Ruffini, a Republican pollster and founding partner of Echelon Insights, told Semafor. All former presidents get better retrospective evaluations when they leave office. We just havent had a chance to test how this would play out when one was a current candidate until now.

One of Bidens biggest weaknesses, according to polling, is the economy. Alyssa Cass, a partner at Slingshot Strategies working on Democratic messaging, told Semafor that voters across the spectrum say their No. 1 issue is costs cost of living, food, housing, and more. The disparity between Trumps polling and Senate Republican candidates, she believes, is because voters associate this key issue with Biden.

Theyre holding Joe Biden responsible for the price pressure they feel every time they go to the grocery store, but arent assigning that same responsibility to their Senate candidate, Cass said. That further makes sense when you have these Senate candidates who are, for the most part, riding on a MAGA platform and putting culture issues front and center. I dont think this is a culture war election. I think this is a how expensive are my groceries election.

Recent polling from Blueprint, overseen by Cass, backs up that theory: Data released on May 16 found young voters are prioritizing kitchen table issues and 52% of those polled trust Trump more than Biden when it comes to lowering prices.

Cook Political Reports recent swing state polling found that not only is Biden seen as inferior to Trump on fighting inflation, but 59% of voters think the president has at least some ability to control prices an expectation that could separate him from down-ballot Democrats who survived a worse economy in the midterms.

Then there are other Biden-specific problems, namely his age 66% of voters said they did not think Biden would finish another term in the same Cook Political Report survey. By a 53%-47% margin, voters also reported being more concerned about Bidens age than Trumps temperament and legal issues, two weaknesses that are more unique to him.

In conversations with Republicans, some also say the race between the two candidates looks different than other partisan contests. Trump has largely focused on playing up his record as president and denigrating Bidens in broad terms, rather than trying to make the race a referendum on policy specifics or ideological purity.

As has been the case for many years, President Trump leads the party and the ticket, and has expanded the Republican coalition to include voters that dont typically vote Republican or vote at all, Danielle Alvarez, an RNC spokeswoman, said.

And finally, some of it may just be simple name recognition. Republican Senate candidates are largely going up against incumbent Democrats this cycle, meaning they may need more time to consolidate right-leaning voters who are still not familiar with their campaign, and may face more resistance from voters who dislike Biden but have voted for their opponents before.

One generalization is that Trump is a much better known entity theres going to be a lot more certainty that people are voting for Trump right now, Natalie Jackson, vice president of GQR Insights & Action and a pollster for Democrats, told Semafor.

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Donald Trump is outrunning other Republicans. What does it mean for November? - Semafor