The reasons people say they leave Donald Trump’s rallies early
The Oklahoman - Bids opened Monday for a contract to supply the state Department of Education with 55,000 Bibles. According to the bid documents, vendors must meet certain specifications: Bibles must be the King James Version; must contain the Old and New Testaments; must include copies of the Pledge of Allegiance, Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights; and must be bound in leather or leather-like material.
A salesperson at Mardel Christian & Education searched, and though they carry 2,900 Bibles, none fit the parameters. But one Bible fits perfectly: Lee Greenwood’s God Bless the U.S.A.
Bible, endorsed by former President Donald Trump and commonly referred
to as the Trump Bible. They cost $60 each online, with Trump receiving
fees for his endorsement.
Philip Bump, Washington Post - Consider the results of a poll conducted by Ipsos for Reuters earlier this year. In that survey, Americans were asked whether various statements were believable, including some that were simple statements of fact. Respondents were asked, for example, whether “Trump called Georgia state officials in an attempt to get them to change the 2020 election outcome in Georgia in an effort to stay president.” This is not a question of opinion; it happened. We know it happened because The Washington Post reported that it happened. And not only did The Post report that it happened, we obtained audio of the call in which Trump does exactly what’s articulated.
About 6 in 10 Americans said that the statement presented in the poll was believable. Only 3 in 10 Republicans did — even though it happened.
There were other statements related to Trump’s effort to overturn the election, too. Republicans were consistently unlikely to describe those statements as believable — including one about Trump inciting the mob on Jan. 6, 2021.
Why don’t Republicans think the statement about Georgia — referring to a conversation in which Trump said that he wanted officials to “find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have” — is believable? Perhaps in part because right-wing media hasn’t spent a lot of time talking about Trump’s actions. That includes limited coverage of the House select committee, and it includes less coverage of things like the Georgia call...
When Fox News has covered the Georgia call, as it did more frequently in August 2023 at the time that Trump was indicted in the state, it has often done so in a way that’s overtly sympathetic to Trump’s position.
“The issue is not whether he wanted to overthrow it, but did he believe that he won,” Fox News’s Jeanine Pirro said at the time of the indictment. “If he believed that he won, pursuing all of these avenues are okay for him because in themselves they are not illegal.”
“If you say, ‘Look, I need to find 11,000 votes,’” she continued, “that’s very different from saying, ‘I need you to find 11,000 votes somewhere.’”
On such split hairs are defenses built. The idea that Trump was justified in trying to subvert the results is a crucial component of Republican defenses of his actions — despite the lack of evidence that this belief was warranted and despite the evidence that Trump didn’t believe it at all.
Since the 2020 election, CNN has repeatedly polled Americans to evaluate their confidence in the results of the election. In January 2021, soon after the riot, about 3 in 10 Americans said they didn’t think the results were legitimate, with about a quarter indicating that they thought there was solid evidence they weren’t. In August 2023, about 4 in 10 said they thought the election wasn’t legitimate, with slightly fewer saying their belief was rooted in solid evidence.
Among Republicans, though, 7 in 10 have consistently said they thought the election wasn’t legitimate. The only change has been that, in January 2021, more than half said there was solid evidence to that effect. Now, far more are likely to say that this is only their suspicion.
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