TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — When President Donald Trump falsely claimed Wednesday morning that the pending election outcome was “a fraud on the American public” because remaining ballots were being counted, election experts were quick to correct him.
“I think the president is confused, if you want to treat it charitably,” election law expert Edward Foley said after watching Trump’s speech from the White House. “What he describes doesn’t match the reality of the legal process as it applies to counting votes. The votes will be counted in each and every one of these states.”
In a tweet directed at the president, Richard W. Painter, a White House ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush administration, said: “In a representative democracy we don’t just vote. We also count the votes. And that includes the last few million of them.”
