Abrams says concession comparisons to Trump are ‘apples to bowling balls’
Stacey Abrams on Sunday said comparisons between her refusal to concede her loss in a governor’s race to now Gov.-Brian Kemp (R) to President Trump’s refusal to concede the presidential race are “apples and bowling balls.”
“[I]t’s not simply different circumstances. It’s apples and bowling balls,” Abrams told ABC’s Martha Raddatz Sunday on “This Week.”
Abrams refused to concede in 2018 an argued that voter suppression contributed to her loss.
But she aid the big difference was that the prevailed with some of her arguments, while courts have rejected Trump’s.
“I pointed out that there were a series of actions taken that impeded the ability of voters to cast their ballots. And in almost every one of those circumstances, the courts agreed, as did the state legislature,” she told Raddatz.
MORE: @martharaddatz presses Stacey Abrams on parallels of not conceding in 2018 GA gubernatorial race and Pres. Trump’s attempts to undermine the election.
Abrams: “I pointed out there were a series of actions taken that impeded the ability of voters to cast their ballots.” https://t.co/D6Bf454eHI
— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) January 3, 2021
“By contrast, President Trump has lost every single one of his challenges in the State of Georgia and he has no evidence. In fact, an audit — the fourth, I think, of this election found that there was zero fraud in our signature match process,” Abrams said. “One person … inadvertently signed for husband against the rules but otherwise we know that the signatures match and that the process works.”
Shortly after the 2018 election, a federal judge ruled Kemp, Georgia’s secretary of state at the time of the vote, likely “fail[ed] to properly maintain a reliable and secure voter registration system,” which “has and will continue to result in the infringement of the rights of the voters to cast their vote and have their votes counted,” according to The Washington Post.
In a separate consent agreement between the Georgia Democratic party and the Secretary of State’s office, the state of Georgia agreed to establish a system for notifying voters in a timely manner if their signatures on absentee ballots were rejected as nonmatches. The president has repeatedly attacked Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s (R) office and Abrams, whose campaign filed the lawsuit that led to it, for this agreement.
The president has repeatedly claimed that Biden’s victory in Georgia was the result of widespread voter fraud, but the courts and GOP officials in the state have said there is no evidence to back up his arguments.
Trump has responded by attacking Republican state officials. He has called for Kemp to be primaried and told Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo he was “ashamed” to have endorsed him in 2018.
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