Ted Cruz urges critics of presidential election challenge to calm down

Sen. Ted Cruz on Sunday condemned those attacking him for his challenge to the certification of the presidential election, saying they were using “angry language.” Cruz and at least 11 other Republican senators have committed to challenging the certification of the Electoral College results Jan. 6, joining an unknown number of House Republicans. Cruz said he wanted to do an emergency 10-day audit of the results, though he did not explain why he expected that audit would overturn President-elect Joe Biden’s victory. Speaking on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures With Maria Bartiromo,” the Texas senator responded to his critics on both sides of the aisle. “I think everyone needs to calm down,” he said. “I think we need to tone down the rhetoric. This is already a volatile situation. It’s like a tinderbox and throwing lit matches into it and so I think the kind of hyperbole we’re seeing, the kind of angry language.” He said that some Democrats had accused him of “treason.” Critics have pointed out that despite repeated, unsupported allegations of fraud by President Donald Trump, every state certified its results — some of them after full recounts — and that dozens of court decisions have upheld the validity of Biden’s victory on Nov. 3. They’ve also noted that Republicans are being selective in challenging results, alleging fraud in certain states won by Biden but not in down-ballot races won by Republicans in those very same states...Regardless, Cruz indicated he had his doubts that the election was lawful. “We went into this election with the country deeply divided, deeply polarized,” Cruz said on Sunday, “and we’ve seen in the last two months unprecedented allegations of voter fraud, and that’s produced a deep, deep distrust of our democratic process across the country. I think we in Congress have an obligation to do something about that. We have an obligation to protect the integrity of the democratic system.”...Cruz said that challenging the results of the election was not an ideal thing for Congress to be doing, but that it seemed better to him than merely accepting the results.“Frankly, two pretty lousy choices,” he said. In order for the GOP congressional challenge to succeed, the House and Senate would have to vote against certification when the Electoral College results are presented in a joint session of Congress on Wednesday with Vice President Mike Pence at the helm. Though Republicans can delay Biden’s certification by a matter of hours — a challenge to the results would lead to debate in both the House and Senate, then a vote — their effort is almost certainly doomed to fail. Democrats hold a majority in the House, and several leading Republicans in the closely divided Senate have made it clear they won’t vote to back the GOP challenge. Some Senate Republicans — including Toomey, Mitt Romney of Utah, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska,and Ben Sasse of Nebraska — have been vocal in condemning the challenge, painting it as a threat to the rule of law...MORE