President Donald Trump urged his supporters Friday not to boycott two Senate runoff elections in Georgia in January that will determine which party has control of the chamber.
His tweet comes after Politico reported Thursday that his continued attacks on Georgia's electoral system have disillusioned his voters and caused some to call for a boycott of the vote.
In addition, Politico reports that some of Trump's most ardent supporters on Twitter and the conservative-learning social media platform Parler are accusing the two Republican candidates up for election — Sens. Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue — of being "insufficiently pro-Trump" and complicit in the voter fraud conspiracies.
On Friday morning, Trump retweeted a Newsmax story about a potential boycott of the Georgia vote. In his tweet, Trump tried to walk the line between continuing to push fraud claims while still rallying the vote.
"No, the 2020 Election was a total scam, we won by a lot (and will hopefully turn over the fraudulent result), but we must get out and help David and Kelly, two GREAT people," he tweeted. "Otherwise we are playing right into the hands of some very sick people. I will be in Georgia on Saturday!"
No, the 2020 Election was a total scam, we won by a lot (and will hopefully turn over the fraudulent result), but we must get out and help David and Kelly, two GREAT people. Otherwise we are playing right into the hands of some very sick people. I will be in Georgia on Saturday! https://t.co/1ziqFq9S6O
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 27, 2020
Since election day, Trump and prominent Republican officials have attempted to cast doubt on the electoral process in Georgia. An audit of the election, which required a hand count of all ballots, reveals that president-elect Joe Biden won the state by about 12,000 votes. The Trump campaign has since filed for a machine recount of the vote tallies, which is not expected to significantly change the vote total.
The Trump campaign and other Republicans have even gone as far as to personally pressure Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger not to certify the results of the election. Raffensperger even said he received a call from Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, who encouraged him to purge legally-cast votes from the record.
On Wednesday, Raffensperger published an op-ed in USA Today in which he described Trump "throwing him under the bus" despite voting for him and donating to his campaign. During an interview on Thanksgiving evening, Trump called Raffensperger an "enemy of the people."
Trump has said he will be campaigning on behalf of Loeffler and Perdue in the month leading up to the runoff elections. Loeffler will square off with Democrat Raphael Warnock, and Perdue will face Jon Ossoff in the Jan. 5 election.
