The Big Lie is Now GOP Orthodoxy
Donald Trump is still off social media as his various attempts to build alternates to Facebook and Twitter fall prey to his longtime lack of any actual business acumen. His rallies have become self-pitying lie-fests that even Fox News is choosing to ignore.
However, the poison he injected into our body politic with the Big Lie about “election fraud” has become the Kool-Aid all Republicans must drink – including here in Virginia.
Amy Gardner (WaPo) has the details on how election trutherism is mere months (or a November miracle) away from infiltrating the General Assembly.
Last month, (Wren) Williams defeated a 14-year incumbent in a Virginia House of Delegates primary after claiming he had seen evidence of fraud while working as a lawyer for the Trump campaign on a lawsuit seeking to overturn the Wisconsin election result. The incumbent, Charles Poindexter, boasts top ratings from the NRA as well as the socially conservative Family Foundation. Williams is widely expected to win easily in the fall in a safely Republican district in Virginia’s rural Southside.
“He said that he had not seen any evidence of voter fraud,” Williams said of his opponent, who did not return calls seeking comment. “And I said that I had seen evidence, because obviously I had played the role of lawyer for Trump in Wisconsin.”
In fact, no evidence of widespread fraud emerged in Wisconsin, where the lawsuit Williams worked on was dismissed and where a recount in the state’s two largest and most heavily Democratic counties affirmed Biden’s victory.
Ironically, Williams let out the actual – and repressed – truth when he says he “played the role of lawyer for Trump.” Anyone who actually followed the lawsuits and the behavior of Trump campaign officials in Wisconsin would best describe it as cosplaying.
Normally, I would be among the first to call “time” on projecting one would-be Delegate’s nonsense on to the entire Republican Party. Sadly, we are not in normal times. Williams has a lot of company – including four Virginia Congressman (three of whom were Republicans in Good standing in the HoD) who refused to acknowledge Joe Biden’s victory in January (right after insurrectionists tried to kill them), a candidate for Arizona Secretary of State who was part of that very insurrection, and a Trump-led purge of any Republicans who challenges the Big Lie.
More importantly, here in Virginia, we don’t elect the Secretary of State; nor do we chose who controls our Election Boards. Control of these vital election posts is determined by one person: the Governor of Virginia.
If Republicans have their way, that would be the fellow out there dog-whistling “election integrity” …
… and local election boards would fall under the control of folks like Wren Williams.
There may come a time when the fever really does break in the GOP – and the RPV in particular. However, until that day comes, we cannot afford to let Republicans control any elections, anywhere.
Here in Virginia, that day is still far off.
