By Katharine Jackson and Bhargav Acharya
WASHINGTON, Feb 2 (Reuters) – President Donald Trump said on Monday that Republicans should “nationalize” and “take over” voting in at least 15 unspecified places, reiterating his false claims that U.S. elections are marred by widespread fraud.
In a podcast interview with his former FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino, Trump — who continues to claim falsely that his 2020 election defeat was the result of fraud — gave no details on what he intended.
Referring to immigrants, the president said on “The Dan Bongino Show”: “These people were brought to our country to vote, and they vote illegally. And you know, amazing that the Republicans aren’t tougher on it.”
“The Republicans should say, we want to take over. We should take over the voting, the voting in at least many, 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting,” Trump said in the interview.
He did not specify the locations but said: “We have states that are so crooked and they’re counting votes. We have states that I won that show I didn’t win.”
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for clarification of Trump’s remarks.
The comments were met with pushback. U.S. Representative Don Bacon, a Republican, said on X, “I opposed nationalizing elections when Speaker Pelosi wanted major changes to elections in all 50 states. I’ll oppose this now as well.”
Separately, Michigan Department of State spokesperson Cheri Hardmon said in a statement: “The U.S. Constitution puts states in charge of elections, not the federal government. That’s the law.”
Bongino returned to his podcast after leaving the Federal Bureau of Investigation last month.
FBI SEARCH
Trump’s comments came days after the FBI searched an election office in Georgia’s Fulton County for 2020 records as the president continues to press false claims of fraud in his 2020 defeat, an accusation that has been rejected by courts, state governments and members of Trump’s own former administration.
Trump, in a departure from law enforcement norms, spoke with some of the FBI agents by cellphone the day after the raid during a meeting they had with Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, the New York Times reported on Monday.
The U.S. will hold midterm elections in November that will determine control of Congress for the next two years.
Under the U.S. Constitution, states and local jurisdictions conduct elections.
(Reporting by Katharine Jackson and Bhargav Acharya; editing by Susan Heavey and Cynthia Osterman)
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