Trump speech fails to deliver smoking gun on voting improprieties - EUROPE SAYS
President Trump’s prime time speech on supposed shortcomings in the nation’s election systemsfailed to deliver any significantly new evidenceand didn’t cast doubt on his loss in the 2020 presidential. . .
President Trump’s prime time speech on supposed shortcomings in the nation’s election systemsfailed to deliver any significantly new evidenceand didn’t cast doubt on his loss in the 2020 presidential election. The 25-minute address to the nation from the White House was billed as exposing “shocking vulnerabilities in our election system,” but Trump didn’t reveal any smoking gun anddramatically underperformed expectationsfrom supporters and critics alike. None of the newly released declassified documents orclaims about voting machinesand undocumented immigrants suggests thatany votes were improperly changedor that any alleged irregularities affected the results of the presidential or other elections. Even right-wing pundit John Solomon, a Trump ally who has promoted voting conspiracy theories, conceded: “the intelligence community has zero evidence that someone has flipped — that a foreign power flipped — a vote in 2020, ‘22 or ’24,” Solomon said. Trump’sbiggest claims in the tightly scripted speechamounted to allegations China sought to influence the 2020 vote and that thousands of undocumented immigrants are poised to vote in upcoming U. S. elections. China did gain access to publicly availableinformation about millions of American voters,analysts agree. But that was already known, and intelligence officials mostly determined that they didn’t launch any effort on behalf of Trump’s opponents or anyone else. President Donald Trump speaks in the East Room of the White House, Thursday, July 16, 2026, in Washington. (Saul Loeb/Pool via AP)The president was mostly silent about thewell-documented Russian effort to boost himin 2016 and other campaigns, allegations he regularly derides as a hoax or worse. Trump also aired claims that up to250,000 undocumented immigrants could be registered to votein a handful of blue states including California. But analysts question those claims, which come from unreliable private sources and say voting by non-citizens is extraordinarily rare and has never been shown to have affected any American election. Trump’s main political goal in making the speech appears to be toramp up pressure on congressional Republicansto pass the SAVE America Act, his package of voting restrictions that GOP leaders say does not have the votes to pass in the Senate. Even many Republicansoppose provisions in that act, especially a proposed ban on mail voting, which is widely considered safe and secure and is used in many red states. President Donald Trump addresses the nation from the East Room of the White House on July 16, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Saul Loeb/Pool – Getty Images)GOP Senate Majority Leader John Thune says the bill is DOA in the chamber, where Republicans hold a small but sturdy 53-47 advantage, and there is no chance of it passing before the midterm elections. Democrats say Trump’s main goal is to preemptively cast doubt on the results of the midterms, which most analysts across the political spectrum expect to dealmajor blows to the GOP. “Trump knows he has lost American families, made their lives more expensive, endangered their friends and families with an unnecessary war,” Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N. Y. ) told the News Friday. “Rather than pivot his policies, he is working to rig the midterms before a single vote has even been cast. ”If the Save America Act were passed, it could force 6 million New York voters to obtain a passport to prove they are U. S. citizens and could ensnare 3. 7 million others whose names do not match their birth certificates, often because they changed their names when getting married, Schumer said. It’s unclearhow many Americans are paying attention. ABC, NBC and CNN did not air Thursday’s remarks live but carried them in full on their streaming services. CBS and MS NOW both cut away from Trump’s speech before he finished, while Fox News continued to carry his address. Trump called out the media outlets for not carrying it live, accused them of being “part of a plot” and suggested their broadcast licenses be revoked.