Coming off the heels of Attorney General Pam Bondi’s demand for access to Minnesota voter rolls and the state’s decisive refusal to comply with that demand, President Trump is now spreading conspiracy theories about the state and is again threatening to try to exert control over the nation’s election systems.
Last month, Bondi attempted to tie the Trump administration’s months-long campaign to seize sensitive voter information from various states across the country, with the recent killing of a U.S. citizen Alex Pretti by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. In a letter to Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz following Pretti’s death, Bondi asked Walz for the state’s voter data in exchange for an end to the “chaos” in Minnesota.
Both Walz and Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon refused to comply and slammed Bondi for her demands. Simon called the letter “an apparent ransom to pay for our state’s peace and security.”
Against this backdrop, Trump’s fixation with Minnesota’s residents and the state’s election administration has continued. In a recent podcast with MAGA conspiracy theorist and former deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino, Trump raised bizarre conspiracy theories about the Somali community in Minneapolis, a group he has long demonized.
“I won the state three times, but I got no credit for it. I won that state three times, but it’s a rigged state. Really rigged badly with the Somalians, and the Somalians and the theft. These are people who don’t work,” Trump told Bongino on a Monday podcast episode. “These are people that are just not an asset to our society to put it mildly. We gotta get ’em out, most of them…”
And at a later point during the same podcast episode, Trump put out a call for Republicans to “nationalize voting,” and take over election administration from the states. That is, of course, something that he constitutionally cannot do.
“The Republicans should say, ‘We want to take over,’” he told Bongino. “We should take over the voting, the voting in at least many — 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.”
He did not specify what “15 places” he was referring to.
Trump’s call to “nationalize the voting,” like his administration’s ongoing crusade to seize states’ voter rolls to, it seems, create some sort of national voter file, is yet another way in which he is attempting to exert control over the election system — a system managed by the states and not the federal government.
Trump also issued an executive order trying to enact nationwide election administration changes, like mandating documentary proof of citizenship and calling for all mail-in ballots to be received by Election Day. Those orders have been mostly shot down by the courts.
For months now, the Trump administration has been demanding sensitive voter data from 44 states across the country. This data, which includes things like social security numbers and driver’s licenses, is not information the federal government is entitled to. The DOJ is currently suing 24 states — including Minnesota — who have not compiled with the demand.
Experts have previously explained to TPM that the most likely reason the administration could want this information is to interfere in the midterm elections and continue to sow seeds of doubt in the nation’s election systems.
It’s always projection with TMF. He’s “worried” about election interference so he’s going to interfere with the election like crazy.
He has entered Tony Robbins territory, except he has 10000 nukes and can unleash smallpox if he gets his feelings hurt.
btw and I know this shows my age, but what do basic cable stations broadcast between 2 and 6 am now?
Because he loves us?
“Nationalize the voting?”
These people have some massive hysterical cow if someone/some country wants to nationalize some corporation, but voting? That’s okay, a good idea?
How these people walk upright defies me sometimes.