Trump's false claims about election fraud will "cost Republicans control" of the Senate, Georgia official says
The results of Georgia's second recount are not expected to affect the outcome of the presidential election. State officials have certified that President-elect Joe Biden beat President Trump in Georgia by more than 10,000 votes.
The president asked for the new recount, as permitted by state law, but some other Republicans are concerned that misinformation spread by Mr. Trump will hurt his party in Senate runoff elections in January that will decide control of the U.S. Senate.
They're telling the president to give up his fight, concede, and stop saying things that are endangering them, and their election workers.
"Our investigators have seen no widespread fraud," Georgia's Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said at a news conference. "It looks like Vice President Biden will be carrying Georgia, and he is our president-elect."
But the president will not accept reality. Instead, he's attacked Republican officials in the state for refusing to change the results in his favor. On Thanksgiving Mr. Trump called Raffensperger "an enemy of the people."
Some of the president's supporters have made death threats against Raffensperger, as well as voting system implementation manager Gabriel Sterling, who blamed the president for inflammatory rhetoric.
"Someone's going to get hurt, someone's going to get shot, someone's going to get killed," Sterling said at a news conference on Tuesday.
Sterling, who now has police protection, said there have been threats against him and other election employees, including a tech worker in his 20s.
"They tracked his family and started harassing his family. There was a tweet where somebody put a swinging noose and said, you know, you've committed treason, may God have mercy on your soul. And at that point, I was pretty much irate. I was done," Sterling told CBS News correspondent Mark Strassmann.
Next month, Georgia will hold two crucial Senate runoff elections. Republicans Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue are trying to hold onto their seats — seats that will decide whether Republicans maintain control of the U.S. Senate.
Democrats are hoping that voter registration efforts will help Jon Ossoff and Reverend Raphael Warnock win enough votes to swing the state.
Meanwhile, the president and his allies continue telling voters that the system is rigged.
"They have not earned your vote. Don't you give it to them. Why would you go back and vote in another rigged election for God's sake?" attorney Lin Wood said at an event in Atlanta.
Sterling said he believes rhetoric like that will suppress votes, "and cost Republicans control of the United States Senate."
"I believe they'll suppress turnout on one side, mainly the Republican one, because they are being told your votes don't count, they're not real," he said.
Mr. Trump will hold a rally in Georgia this weekend to campaign for Senators Loeffler and Perdue.