Bernie Sanders reveals why he accuses Donald Trump of laying groundwork for 'election denial'
WASHINGTON, DC: Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt) has accused former president Donald Trump of deliberately sowing seeds of election denial.
The senator's remarks on Tuesday, August 13, came in response to Trump's recent false claim that a photo showing a large crowd at a campaign rally for Vice President Kamala Harris on August 7 in Detroit had been doctored using artificial intelligence (AI) technology.
Donald Trump's AI allegation against Kamala Harris
On his social media platform Truth Social, Donald Trump alleged that the image of Harris' rally was manipulated, saying, “She ‘A.I.’d’ it, and showed a massive ‘crowd’ of so-called followers, BUT THEY DIDN’T EXIST!”
The GOP presidential nominee further insisted that "there was nobody there" at the rally despite substantial photographic and video evidence as well as eye witness accounts from journalists, confirming that thousands of people attended the rally.
“Look, we caught her with a fake ‘crowd,’” the 78-year-old stated falsely.
Bernie Sanders warns of methods to Donald Trump's 'madness'
In a statement addressing Donald Trump's false claims, Bernie Sanders said, “Donald Trump may be crazy, but he’s not stupid."
"When he claims that ‘nobody’ showed up at a 10,000 person Harris-Walz rally in Michigan that was live-streamed and widely covered by the media, that it was all AI, and that Democrats cheat all the time, there is a method to his madness," the senator said.
“Clearly, and dangerously, what Trump is doing is laying the groundwork for rejecting the election results if he loses,” he noted.
Suggesting that the claims are part of Trump's broader strategy to undermine trust in the electoral process, Sanders said, “If you can convince your supporters that thousands of people who attended a televised rally do not exist, it will not be hard to convince them that the election returns in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and elsewhere are ‘fake’ and ‘fraudulent.’”
“This is what undermining democracy is about. This is what fascism is about,” he continued.
"This is why we must do everything we can to see that Trump is defeated," Sanders added.
The rally in question, which took place at an airport in Detroit, reportedly drew an estimated 15,000 attendees who came to support Harris and her running mate Minnesota Governor Tim Walz (D).
The Harris campaign has reported similarly large turnouts of supporters at other rallies across the country, including 12,000 people attendees in Philadelphia and Eau Claire, Wisconsin, as well as 15,000 supporters in Glendale, Arizona, according to The Hill.
