Stolen, rigged and illegitimate: Democrats’ long history of objecting to election results

Democrats such as Hillary Clinton, Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams and dozens of congressional lawmakers have long objected to state and federal election results and have attempted to block every Republican presidential winner since 2000.

No Democrat has been prosecuted for challenging election results. The party also rejects any attempt to draw an equivalence to the actions of Donald Trump, even though top House Democrats objected to the certification of his presidential victory in 2016.

Mr. Trump is now facing dozens of state and federal charges related to his effort to overturn Joseph R. Biden’s victory in the 2020 election. A 41-count indictment in Georgia also targets 18 of his former advisers, aides and allies.

The charges center on Mr. Trump’s attempt to prevent Congress from certifying Mr. Biden’s victory. The evidence included in the indictment in Fulton County, Georgia, cites the president’s numerous tweets contesting the election results and phone calls to aides, lawmakers and election officials seeking to challenge Mr. Biden’s narrow win in Georgia and other swing states.

As Mrs. Clinton, former secretary of state and the 2016 Democratic presidential candidate, and others gloat over the prosecution of Mr. Trump, Republicans say the case is utter hypocrisy and politically motivated.

Mr. Trump is the runaway leader in the Republican presidential primary and is likely on track to face off against President Biden on the November 2024 ballot. The two remain neck and neck in general election polls.

“This indictment isn’t about President Trump claiming the election was stolen,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia Republican, said on the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter. “If it was, Stacey Abrams and Hillary Clinton would be in jail.”

Mrs. Clinton said for years that Mr. Trump’s 2016 victory was unfair. She won the popular vote but lost in critical swing states, which gave Mr. Trump the electoral advantage and the presidency.

After her defeat, Mrs. Clinton claimed Mr. Trump won the election by colluding with Russian operatives and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The claim was the basis for a much-criticized Justice Department investigation that hobbled Mr. Trump’s presidency and showed no evidence of collusion.

“I believe he knows he’s an illegitimate president,” Mrs. Clinton told CBS News in September 2019.

Mrs. Clinton continued her argument until Mr. Trump’s defeat in 2020.

In 2019, Mrs. Clinton said she warned Democrats running for president, “You can run the best campaign, you can even become the nominee, and you can have the election stolen from you.”

Mrs. Clinton advised Mr. Biden, the Democratic presidential nominee, three months before the 2020 election that he “should not concede under any circumstances because I think this is going to drag out.”

Mrs. Clinton laughed heartily on the set of MSNBC’s “Rachel Maddow Show” last week over the news of the Fulton County charges against Mr. Trump.

“Yet another set of indictments!” she exclaimed.

Mrs. Clinton and Ms. Maddow did not discuss Mrs. Clinton’s past statement accusing Mr. Trump of stealing the 2016 election. Instead, they agreed that Mr. Trump is guilty of attempting to undermine democracy, in part by declaring the 2020 election stolen.

“Justice is being pursued,” Mrs. Clinton said.

She is among dozens of prominent Democrats who have objected to Republican election wins.

Ms. Abrams refused to concede after her narrow loss to Republican Brian Kemp in Georgia’s 2018 governor’s race. Ms. Abrams said the election was “rigged” and “stolen” because of voter suppression. She refused to fully acknowledge that she lost, even during her second, unsuccessful bid in 2021 to defeat Mr. Kemp. “He won under the rules of the game at the time, but the game was rigged against the voters of Georgia,” Ms. Abrams said on CNN in December 2021.

Democrats have gone far beyond election fraud claims.

Congressional Democrats, mostly in the House, have objected to certifying every Republican presidential win since 2000.

Congress is required under the Constitution to certify the election results in each state. When the House voted to certify Mr. Trump’s 2016 victory, nearly a dozen Democrats tried to block it.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, told reporters that she backed the effort by her rank-and-file dissenters but knew it lacked enough support to thwart Mr. Trump’s victory.

“In some cases, members are concerned about voter suppression, in some cases they are concerned about Russian influence on our election. There are a number of concerns,” she said.

Mrs. Pelosi pumped her fist in the chamber when nearly a dozen Democrats stood up to object to certifying Mr. Trump as the winner. Among the objectors was Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, now the top Democrat on the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, and Rep. Maxine Waters of California, the top Democrat on the Financial Services Committee.

Rep. Barbara Lee, California Democrat, was among those who stood up to oppose the certification of Mr. Trump’s election win.

“I object because people are horrified,” Ms. Lee said.

Claiming election fraud and voter suppression, Democrats objected to the certification of both of George W. Bush’s presidential wins in 2000 and 2004.

Mr. Raskin, who served as the lead manager in Mr. Trump’s 2021 impeachment case, said in a statement that the Georgia indictment “makes it clear states will not allow interstate criminal racketeering enterprises to overthrow democratic elections.”

Legal experts declined to compare Mr. Trump to House Democrats objecting to the certification of Republican presidential winners and the dozens of House Republicans and some senators who objected to Mr. Biden’s win in 2020.

Mr. Trump is charged with conspiracy to overturn the election, but members of Congress are legally authorized to object to Electoral College results.

“Actions on the floor of Congress are protected by the speech or debate clause of the Constitution, and Republican objections on the floor under the Electoral Count Act are similar to the 2000, 2004 and 2016 actions,” Notre Dame law professor Derek T. Muller said. “I think it’s why you haven’t seen much focus on what members of Congress did on the floor of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021, in these prosecutions.”