Trump says he would win California if ‘Jesus … was the vote counter’

Former President Trump suggested during an interview with television psychologist “Dr. Phil” McGraw that he would win California if Jesus Christ was the one counting ballots.

“Democrats play a different game. And you have ballot harvesting, but you also have people getting ballots,” he said during the interview. “I mean, in California, you have people getting seven ballots.”

“If Jesus Christ came down and was the vote counter, I would win California, OK?” the former president added later. “In other words, if we had an honest vote counter, a really honest vote counter — I do great with Hispanics, great, I mean at a level no Republican has ever done. But if we had an honest vote counter, I would win California.”

Seemingly surprised, McGraw asked, “You think so?”

Trump, the GOP nominee for president, reaffirmed his claim, in part blaming mail-in voting. 

“I think so. I do. I see it. I go around California, they have Trump signs all over the place,” he said in the interview. “It’s a very dishonest [state]; everything is mail-in. They send out 38 million ballots, I think it is.” 

There has been no evidence indicating far-reaching voter fraud in the state of California.

A Republican presidential candidate has not won the state since George H. W. Bush in 1988. President Biden won California by nearly 30 points in 2020. 

Vice President Harris’s campaign released a statement Tuesday saying Trump “reached a level of delusion difficult for even Dr. Phil to diagnose.”

The team also criticized the former president for his job record during the tail end of his term, for denying the results of the 2020 election and for the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade in 2022 — which ended the federal right to abortion access.

“As Donald Trump’s friend Dr. Phil says, ‘you can’t change what you don’t acknowledge,'” Sarafina Chitika, a Harris campaign spokesperson, said in a statement.

“And he still doesn’t acknowledge that he lost the 2020 election four years ago – despite the violent insurrection launched in his name,” Chitika added. “While Donald Trump refuses to acknowledge the facts, voters know Vice President Harris is the candidate to lead us into the future.”

Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) also weighed in on the former president’s remarks, seemingly mocking him.

“I’m just an ordinary Catholic, but I’m thinking that Jesus probably wouldn’t come down for a man found liable by a jury for sexual assault,” he wrote on the social platform X. “And since Jesus invented the laws of the universe, including math, He would certify that Trump lost California. And GA, NV, AZ, WI, MI, PA.”

The Hill/Decision Desk HQ’s polling index shows Biden was leading Trump in the Golden State by about 25 percent — 55.5 percent to 30.6 percent — before the president’s decision to withdraw from the race and endorse Harris to run in his place.