It’s been a busy 15 hours for Donald Trump, attacking Florida GOP Governor Ron DeSantis, appearing to admit to election interference – “fraud,” as a former top DOJ official called it – reposting QAnon memes and a large number of “I love Trump,” and “We love Trump” posts, promoting lies about “Rigged Elections,” and now, a racist attack against Virginia Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin.
“Young Kin (now that’s an interesting take. Sounds Chinese, doesn’t it?) in Virginia couldn’t have won without me,” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform. “I Endorsed him, did a very big Trump Rally for him telephonically, got MAGA to Vote for him – or he couldn’t have come close to winning.”
It was a warning shot across the bow to Youngkin: don’t even think about running for president in 2024, a possibility multiple news outlets have suggested could happen.
That warning shot on his Truth Social platform came hours after Trump, in a series of 10 rage “truths” – akin to “tweets” on Twitter – attempted to extinguish any thought Florida GOP Governor Ron DeSantis might have of launching a 2024 presidential run. Trump even made clear that was his intention.
“…And now, Ron DeSanctimonious is playing games! Trump wrote. “The Fake News asks him if he’s going to run if President Trump runs, and he says, ‘I’m only focused on the Governor’s race, I’m not looking into the future.’ Well, in terms of loyalty and class, that’s really not the right answer…”
Also on Thursday Trump officially has sent out invitations for a “special announcement” next week.
“President Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States of America, will hold a special announcement at the Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Florida on Tuesday, November 15, 2022, at 9:00PM EST,” an invitation sent from a campaign email address reads, as Florida Politics reports.
But perhaps the most shocking of all of this frenzied, frenetic, flailing energy was this post, in which Trump appears to admit to election interference.
“…I also fixed his campaign, which had completely fallen apart,” Trump said in his posts about Gov. Ron DeSantis. “I was all in for Ron, and he beat [Democrat Andrew] Gillum, but after the Race, when votes were being stolen by the corrupt Election process in Broward County, and Ron was going down ten thousand votes a day, along with now-Senator Rick Scott, I sent in the FBI and the U.S. Attorneys, and the ballot theft immediately ended, just prior to them running out of the votes necessary to win. I stopped his Election from being stolen…”
Again, Trump said: “I sent in the FBI and the U.S. Attorneys, and the ballot theft immediately ended, just prior to them running out of the votes necessary to win.”
That would be “fraud,” according to Andrew Weissman, the well-known former FBI General Counsel, former chief of the Criminal Fraud Section of the U.S. DOJ, and a member of the 2017 special counsel team headed by Robert Mueller.
Weissman Thursday night tweeted, “last I checked Trump’s sending in FBI and DOJ to interfere with election tabulation would be, well, fraud.”