What if Trump won't accept 2020 defeat? [View all]

[Celerity]

The situations all seem far-fetched, but the president's comments have people chattering in the halls of Congress and throughout the Beltway.

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/06/21/trump-election-2020-1374589

In 2016, Donald Trump waffled over whether he would accept the election results if he lost.

Since then, Trump has repeatedly joked about staying in office beyond the two terms the Constitution allows. Jerry Falwell Jr., Trump’s most prominent evangelical supporter, has suggested Trump should get two years tacked on to his first term as “pay back” for the Mueller investigation. The president’s own former lawyer, Michael Cohen, has warned that “there will never be a peaceful transition of power” should Trump fail in his reelection bid.

The scenarios all seem far-fetched — “It’s almost a question for science fiction movies,” cracked a former top Secret Service official — but the constant drumbeat nonetheless has people chattering in the halls of Congress and throughout the Beltway: What if Trump won’t accept defeat in 2020?

And one scenario in particular has Democrats nervous: the lawsuit-happy Trump contests the election results in court.

“It’s been a worry in the back of my mind for the last couple years now,” said Rep. Brendan Boyle, a Pennsylvania Democrat. California Rep. Ted Lieu, a frequent Trump critic and early impeachment inquiry supporter, acknowledged the same concern but said he trusted law enforcement “would do the right thing” and “install the winner” of the election. Even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has told her party to prepare for the possibility that Trump contests the 2020 results.

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