WASHINGTON ― Members of Congress are on edge about the possibility of more violence in this year’s presidential election, less than four years after a mob of Donald Trump supporters ransacked the U.S. Capitol seeking to prevent the certification of President Joe Biden’s win in the 2020 contest.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are anticipating that Trump, who faces felony charges for working to overturn the results of the last election, will again sow chaos and challenge the election results if he loses to Vice President Kamala Harris.
“If for some reason he were to lose, he will contest the validity of the election, just like he did last time,” Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) told HuffPost this week, warning that the former president is liable to invent a reason to do so.
“If he were to lose ― particularly if he were to lose by a small margin ― of course, he will contest it… and there could well be disruption if that were the case,” Romney said.
“I’m worried about another January 6 scenario because former President Trump is acting like he did when he lost the last time,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said. “I mean, you don’t have to be a mind reader to know what their game plan is ― they’re saying the silent part out loud.”
Trump’s lies about voter fraud in the last election incited the violent Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, where more than 140 police officers sustained injuries while defending the building. Five people died after the riot, and the attack on Congress caused about $2.7 billion in damages, according to the Government Accountability Office.
This time around, Trump and his Republican allies are attempting to stir fears about noncitizen voting, something that is illegal and rarely happens. The former president has refused to commit to accepting November’s election results, and last month, he told supporters the only way he can lose is if the Democrats “cheat.” Earlier this week, Trump reprised his lies about the “stolen” 2020 election during a debate with Harris in Philadelphia.
“No, I don’t acknowledge that at all,” the GOP presidential nominee said when asked if he was finally admitting that he lost the White House race four years ago.
Trump has also threatened jail time for his opponents if he wins the presidency again. “WHEN I WIN, those people that CHEATED” in 2020 or 2024 “will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law, which will include long term prison sentences,” he wrote last week on his platform Truth Social. “Please beware that this legal exposure extends to Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials.”
The chances of another violent Jan. 6-like event occurring at the Capitol this time around seem smaller. The federal government this week took steps to increase security in Washington ahead of and on Jan. 6, 2025, the date of the next electoral certification in Congress, designating the vote counting a “National Special Security Event.”
It’ll also be more difficult for members of Congress to successfully challenge any state’s electoral vote and force a lengthy debate on the Senate floor. The Electoral Count Reform Act, passed in 2022, raised the threshold to lodge an objection to electors to at least one-fifth of members of both the House and the Senate. (In 2021, the support of only one senator was required to lodge an objection to electors.)
“My hope is that that critically needed update to the Electoral Count Act will make another January 6 unlikely,” Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), an author of the bill, told HuffPost.
Sen. Chris Muphy (D-Conn.), meanwhile, said the reforms to the process make it harder “to use the Senate or the House as a mechanism to promote a conspiracy theory, but it doesn’t eliminate that threat, and it certainly doesn’t eliminate the prospect of violence if Trump tries to rally a mob again.”
Some Republicans could try and challenge the electoral vote in the event of a Trump loss anyway, despite the higher threshold required to lodge an objection.
Asked if he could see himself objecting to the electoral vote again, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), who is one of eight GOP senators who challenged the 2020 election results, told HuffPost: “Not unless there’s widespread voter fraud.” He said his objection to Pennsylvania’s electors was based on voting changes in that election.
“I hope we would not see anything like that again, ever,” Hawley said.
Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who also challenged the 2020 election results, declined to answer when asked if he would do so again, calling the question a “hypothetical.”
“I hope Trump wins by a landslide so there won’t be any issues,” Scott said.
Asked what he would do if there were issues with the coming election, the senator responded: “I hope not. It’s not good for the country.”
More than 30 House members, including half a dozen Republicans, have signed a bipartisan pledge to uphold the results of the 2024 election, according to Politico. None of the six Republicans who signed the pledge, however, objected to the results last time.
Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.), who objected to the 2020 electoral vote alongside 138 other Republicans when he served in the House, refused to commit to upholding the results of the 2024 election in an interview on CNN.
“It’s hard to say what you’re going to do and what you’re not,” Mullin said. “I’m not going to sit here and tell you what I’m going to do and not going to do until I can see the results.”
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