Clinton says she may contest the results of the 2016 election!
CNN reports:
In interviews over the last week surrounding the release of her 2016 memoir “What Happened,” Hillary Clinton has been hugely critical of President Donald Trump. She’s suggested he is a misogynist and said repeatedly that she fears for the country with Trump in charge.
But in an interview Monday with NPR’s Terry Gross, Clinton raised that critique up a notch — not only questioning the legitimacy of Trump’s presidency but refusing to rule out the possibility of contesting the results if Russian collusion is proven by special counsel Bob Mueller.Here’s the full text of the back-and-forth, courtesy of CNN’s Dan Merica:Gross: I want to get back to the question, would you completely rule out questioning the legitimacy of this election if we learn that the Russian interference in the election is even deeper than we know now?Clinton: No. I would not. I would say —
Gross: You’re not going to rule it out?Clinton: No, I wouldn’t rule it out.!!!!This a big deal. The 2016 Democratic nominee, who won the popular vote by nearly 3 million votes, is expressly leaving open the possibility that she would pursue legal action to invalidate the last presidential election.I’ve paid close attention to what Clinton’s been saying since she lost the election and I have never heard her broach the possibility of a formal challenge of the results.Knowing what we know of Clinton, it seems unlikely to me that she simply spoke off the cuff here, that this was just an unconsidered remark. She doesn’t really do that sort of thing.And, context matters too. Clinton floated the idea of formally contesting the election after she said this about how she envisions her role in the party going forward: “I expect to be really active, and my voice, I’m going to keep out there. I’m not going to just go slowly and quietly into that good night.”Given all of that, it’s logical to conclude Clinton knew what she was doing here.The harder-to-answer questions are a) how she would go about challenging the election and b) what the prospects for such a challenge actually working might be.
Nothing would make Trump a happier man than Clinton trying to relitigate the results of the 2016 election. It might even be enough to get him re-elected in 2020.
Democrats must be despairing that Clinton is continuing to have such a high profile.