Why won't Trump just admit defeat?
More than six months after the vote, there is no cogent evidence of wide-spread fraud in the 2020 US Presidential election. The results were assessed and confirmed everywhere across the country. No litigation succeeded in overturning any part of the vote anywhere. The constitutional process has played itself out. Joe Biden is legitimately the President of the United States.
No previous candidate has ever done what Trump is doing. By continuing to mobilize his party and supporters against the election result, he is testing American democracy, and he may be setting up a situation that could explode into even more violence at some point in the future.
So why is he doing this?
There are two reasons.
The first related to Trump's psychology. Trump's worst fear is to ever be seen as a "loser". The fact that he actually lost an election is unacceptable to him to the very core of his being. He is never a loser in his mind, even to the extent that he has to cheat (golf) or lie (elections and many other things) to avoid the approbation that comes with losing. The man has a screw loose. He lost the election...he is a loser.
The second reason is related and has to do with the fact that he is a criminal. At the very least, it is illegal in the USA to use campaign contributions to pay ladies you have slept with to keep their mouths shut about it. There is no question he instructed his lawyer - Cohen - to do just that. At some point, charges will follow and he will be convicted. The prospect of heading to prison would no doubt be too much for Trump to bear...only losers go to the slammer.
This matters because the President of the United States cannot be charged with a crime while he is president. If Trump had won the election, he would be untouchable for four more years, which would have given him time to figure a way out of his various criminal messes...perhaps stepping aside as long as his successor pardoned him for any and all federal crimes that he may have ever committed.
And so, Trump is keeping alive the idea that he did not lose the 2020 election as a criminal defense for when he is charged with at least the charges noted above, and likely many more. When he is charged with any crime, his defense will be that he is actually properly the President of the United States, and that no charges may be brought against him.
In terms of specific tactics, if he can stay out of jail until the 2022 mid-term elections, and should the Republicans retake the House of Representatives and the Senate, he could coerce his lackeys in the Republican Party to put through a motion recognizing him as the true President of the United States, and repudiating the election of Joe Biden. Trump then would be able to go to any court and say that, because it is at least possible that he could be restored as the President of the United States, any charges should at least be stayed.
Of course, if such a move were supported by Republican states, this could lead to talk of civil war. Given the violence of his supporters, one would think that tens of thousands would take to the streets, armed and ready to support him.
While the country would verge on catastrophe in this scenario, Trump would still be a winner.
And isn't that all that really matters?
