Trump Lays the Groundwork to Reject the 2026 Midterm Election Results

Donald Trump laid the groundwork for challenging the 2026 midterm election results in a prime time address Thursday evening, setting the stage for a deepening constitutional crisis in the United States. After declaring the results of the 2020 election in Georgia invalid this week and Georgia’s two Democratic Senators illegitimate, Trump used his 24-minute address—which was not carried by CNN, ABC, or NBC—to present without evidence an accusation that China had compromised millions of voter files and conspired to influence the 2020 election results.

 ”Every American deserves to know that when they cast their vote, that vote will be counted accurately in a system, and that is to make that system secure,” Trump said to camera. “One where cheating and interference are not just difficult, but virtually impossible. Unfortunately, the system we have today falls catastrophically short of that standard.”

Trump then announced he would declassify and present “critical intelligence” showing just how vulnerable U.S. elections are to foreign interference, but never actually presented any of this evidence during his address.

 ”Tonight, I’m announcing the immediate declassification and release of critical intelligence revealing shocking vulnerabilities in our election infrastructure,” Trump continued. “This evidence shows that the election system we have dangerously exposes, and really exposes like levels never thought possible, to hacking, exploitation, and foreign interference. Just as disturbingly, this vital information has for many years been covered up and hidden from you, the American people, our beautiful, our great American people.”

Trump laid the blame squarely at China, suggesting they had breached voter files and obtained private information on 220 million Americans. Trump suggested the Chinese were motivated by a desire to get him out of office, while Liu Chang, spokesperson for the Chinese ​embassy in Washington said before the speech: “China has never and will never interfere in the presidential elections of the U.S.”

Trump said documents were uncovered in so-called “burn bags” put in place by Barack Obama, but through the incompetence of the perpetrators the burn bags were never burned, and the documents containing the evidence of the Chinese infiltration still exist.

“It was supposed to be burned. These bags were supposed to be at a different level by different people, incinerated and checked, but it never happened. Maybe we got lucky. We believe this was not done on purpose, but rather through gross incompetence of the people that were supposed to burn the bags. But the findings are stunning. “

“The documents cover five major areas of concern,” Trump continued. “First, they show that over a period of years, starting during the 2020 election cycle, the People’s Republic of China carried out what is believed to be the largest compromise of election data in history, resulting in China’s illicit acquisition of two hundred and twenty million US voter files.”

“That information includes names, addresses, phone numbers, political party preferences, and other sensitive data that would be needed to register to vote and engage in other nefarious activities, which is exactly what was happening. This data loss presents an unprecedented election security nightmare. The intelligence even shows that China has signed a data exploitation unit specifically to this new project.”

Only two months ago Trump visited China on an official state visit where he praised the government of President Xi Jinping and announced a new deal for cooperation between the two global economic powerhouses. Trump failed to mention why, if the Chinese attack on U.S. democracy six years ago until today was so potent, he never addressed it during his China trip.

Trump then said he would ask the Director of National Intelligence, the DOJ, the FBI and the CIA to investigate why information on the Chinese breach was kept secret, and arrest anyone involved in the “coverup.”

“Today, I’m asking the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Department of Justice, the FBI, and the CIA to investigate how and why such crucial information was hidden, to fire those involved in the cover-up, and to file criminal charges, if appropriate, against these people.”

Trump failed to mention that he was president in 2020 when this alleged election breach was going on. He ran the DNI, DOJ, CIA, and FBI, and should have had intelligence reported to him that all this was going on, but apparently no action was taken to stop it.

Trump further failed to explain how Joe Biden and the Democrats manage to steal a presidential election—apparently aided by the Chinese—in 2020 when he lost, but did not repeat the same effort in 2024 when he won. Trump deliberately described a “coverup,” and suggested that the perpetuators are still at-large and presumably still working in the national security apparatus of the United States. To this date, Trump has brought no prosecutions for any charge related to fraud committed in the 2020 election, despite being two years into his 2nd term.

All this language sets the stage for Trump to deny the legitimacy of the 2026 midterm elections in November, which his Republican Party is largely expected to lose amid some of the lowest presidential approval polling numbers of Trump’s career.