In prime-time speech, Trump reportedly plans to bore the nation with grievances about the 2020 election, even though he's admitted many times that he lost

(Central Oregon Daily News -- Facebook)

Donald Trump has announced plans to give a prime-time speech tonight on "free and fair elections," noting that it will include "really, really big news."  CNN doesn't seem convinced of the event's grandiosity, stating in an article that the speech is "setting up yet another high-profile opportunity for the president to dispute the results of the 2020 election he lost." In other words, it might just be a case of Trump going over tired, old ground.

It could be especially tired because Trump has admitted on a number of occasions that he lost in 2020, fair and square. In fact, we have written on the very subject several times here at Legal Schnauzer. (We will have specifics in a moment.)

A report from Mediaite and Yahoo! News says Trump is expected to focus on the battleground state of Georgia, perhaps even claiming U.S. Senators Jon Ossoff and Ralphael Warnock, both Democrats, were the beneficiaries of "illegitimate" victories.  Other reports claim Trump will point to foreign interference in U.S. elections.

As you might expect, Trump's plans drew fiery responses from Georgia's two senators. From the Mediaite/Yahoo! report:

Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) and Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA) wasted no time attacking a report claiming President Donald Trump plans to push long-debunked conspiracy theories about Georgia's 2020 election results in an upcoming speech, with Ossoff slamming the commander in chief as a fearful, 'failed president.'

Ossoff and Warnock were elected by razor-thin margins in the heated 2020 elections, with both races going to runoffs.

The pair helped Democrats take control of the chamber as Trump also lost the White House to Joe Biden — a defeat the president has yet to accept. (Actually, that's not quite true. Maybe Trump has not accepted the defeat in his own mind, but he has admitted he lost -- so any claim that he was cheated figures to come across as weak. We will have more on that in a moment.)

Trump announced on Monday via a Truth Social post that he plans to speak to the nation on Thursday evening, with subsequent reports claiming the president intends to push new allegations about the 2020 election, and the legitimacy of Ossoff and Warnock's victories.

Ossoff went on the offensive in a scathing X post, tying Trump's speech and conspiracies to the upcoming midterms and his own opponent, Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA).

"Donald Trump's spiral continues. The failed president, pocketing billions as he drives up prices, is afraid to lose the midterms," Ossoff wrote.

"So he will reheat debunked election conspiracy theories and tell bizarre new lies to deny his 2020 defeat and attack voting rights. This is a disaster for Trump puppet Mike Collins," he added.

"Already mired in scandal, Mike will now have to double down on conspiracy theories toxic in the General Election," Ossoff continued.

"From the start, Trump's obsession with Georgia elections revealed his fury that Black voters were instrumental to his defeat. I'm asking concerned citizens nationwide to join me and support our voter protection efforts in Georgia."

Warnock joined the fray, saying Trump is not just looking behind, but also looking ahead, adding that Georgians will not be easily intimidated by the president's tactics:

Donald Trump is at war with our democracy and Georgia is ground zero. But this is John Lewis’ Georgia. We are not intimidated. We are not moved. Mr. President, instead of attacking our democracy, why don’t you do something about the high cost of gas, housing, and health care?

"Donald Trump is trying to cast doubt on 2020 to justify interfering in 202," he added. "We see what he is doing and it will not work. Stay vigilant." 

As for claims about foreign interference, Mediaite and Yahoo! provide insights under the headline "Trump will use prime-time speech to claim newly declassified Intel reveals foreign plot in 2020 election":

President Donald Trump will reportedly use his prime-time address on Thursday night to push specific new claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

On Monday afternoon, Trump announced on Truth Social that he'd be giving a Thursday speech. The third-person post read:

Donald Trump will be making a Speech to the Nation on Thursday evening, at 9 P.M. Eastern. Thank you for your attention to this matter!

At the time, it was unclear what Trump would talk about during the speech. On Deadline: White House, MS NOW's Nicolle Wallace revealed Trump's speech would focus on the six-year-old election — citing a report from the network's Jake Traylor. Specifically, the president will reportedly point to newly-declassified reports he claims will show foreign interference in the 2020 election. She added:

Donald Trump appears to be taking his assault on the truth, and democracy, and American elections, to primetime. MS NOW is now reporting that Trump will deliver an address Thursday evening where he plans to unveil another round of lies about why he lost in 2020 to Joe Biden. This time, claiming that newly declassified reports reveal foreign interference in the election that his own government didn't know about at the time, lies that seemed to conveniently obscure that he was the President of the United States. All of his handpicked people ran every facet of the government in 2020. His handpicked Attorney General Bill Barr ran the Justice Department. His handpicked replacement for Jim Comey, Chris Wray, ran the FBI. Both of them have repeatedly and publicly debunked these lies that there was any foreign interference. 

Trump's claims about foreign interference are hopelessly vague, even by his standards. What country interfered in the 2020 election, and what did they expect to gain from it? Did they gain from it? Since Trump's team was in charge at the time, why did they let this happen? Was it gross incompetence, the kind that always seems to surround a Trump administration? Is Trump claiming that Denmark and Greenland joined hands in a nefarious plot to help Joe Biden beat Trump?

No one seems to know, and maybe it's just as well. If Trump is to claim he was cheated, even he doesn't seem to believe that. Following are four times where Trump has admitted he lost the 2020 election to Joe Biden. They come from our Legal Schnauzer post dated May 18, 2026. We invite you to click the links and check out the details. If Trump truly is trying to change his tune at this late date, he is even more pathetic than many of us thought:

They don't have much of anything, and it's nuttier when you understand that the man at the center of it all, Trump himself, has admitted over and over that he lost the 2020 election. Consider this from our post dated May 5, 2025, in which we noted that Trump used the occasion of Rudy Guiliani's hospitalization in an attempt to reignite claims he was cheated in the 2020 election . . . . 

What about the section I highlighted above as being of particular importance? In it, Trump is claiming Democrats "cheated on the Elections," an apparent reference to the 2020 presidential election that Trump lost to Joe Biden. Here is the key point: Trump now claims, and has been claiming for some time, that he was cheated in that election -- even though he already has admitted that he lost. Here are several examples where Trump said he knew he lost, usually using the term "by a whisker":

* NBC News: Trump admits in podcast appearance that he did not win the election against Joe Biden;

* The Guardian: Trump privately admitted to aides he lost the election, top aides testify;

* Common Cause: Eight times Trump knew he lost; 

* Mother Jones: Trump finally is admitting he lost the 2020 election.

After all of these times admitting that he lost in 2020, why did Trump use the occasion of Rudy Giuliani's hospitalization to change course and claim Democrats won by cheating -- which in his own words, he knows is not true? 

Is Trump counting on voters to forget, or ignore, all the times he admitted that he lost in 2020? That's the only reason I can come up with that Trump would be trying such a charade six years later.

On day one of his confirmation, Blanche wrestles with questions of DOJ independence, indicating we soon will see Trump acting as president and prosecutor

(MS NOW)

During day one of his confirmation hearing yesterday, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche struggled with questions about independence of the Department of Justice (DOJ) from the Trump White House. Those answers should not have been hard to answer given that acting independently of the president long has been the U.S. norm. In fact, the DOJ's own Justice Manual states as much in clear language -- and Blanche should know that, given that he is asking the U.S. Senate to confirm him as our nation's next full-fledged attorney general.

So why did Blanche seem uncertain about language in the manual that is to guide how his department operates? Sarah Ewall-Wice, a writer at The Daily Beast, pondered that question and concluded that Blanche struggled with independence-related queries because he does not really run the Justice Department; Donald Trump does.

If the Senate confirms Blanche as AG, Americans can expect Trump to issue all manner of directives about who he does and does not want prosecuted -- based almost entirely on who he perceives to be an enemy and who he considers to be a friend. Don't look for the constitutional standard of "probable cause" to be part of the equation, probably because Trump is far more interested in his own grievances than he is the U.S. Constitution. And under that likely series of events, Americans can look for Blanche to go along with anything Trump commands -- as you would expect of any good toady.

Perhaps the most troubling part of this scenario is that it suggests Blanche has no intention of following the DOJ's Justice Manual -- and that Blanche is fine with Trump acting as both president and prosecutor, even though his background (and our nation's recent history) tell us he is not fit to do either. Should this disqualify Blanche to be AG? My answer is yes. Will Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee agree with me? Probably not. (We will have more on the precise language in the DOJ Justice Manual in a moment.)

Sarah Ewall-Wice considers weighty issues connected to all of this under the headline "Todd Blanche admits sinister truth of who really runs Justice; the acting attorney general made the dramatic revelation during his confirmation hearing." Ewall-Wice writes:

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said the quiet part out loud on Wednesday in two jaw-dropping admissions as he was grilled about the independence of the Justice Department.

Blanche, who previously served as President Donald Trump’s personal criminal attorney, was appearing on Capitol Hill for his confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee as he seeks to fill the top spot at DOJ permanently.

It comes as critics of the president have sounded the alarm about Trump weaponizing the Justice Department against his perceived political enemies since returning to office. 

For anyone paying attention to the confirmation hearing -- and Ewall-Wice was --  it should have been apparent that critics' concerns about Trump's weaponization were well-founded. In fact, Blanche's own words indicate weaponization was going on while he served as deputy AG and acting AG -- and almost certainly will continue if he is confirmed as AG. Ewall-Wice makes it clear that's not how things are supposed to work:

The department is supposed to operate independently of political influences on investigations and prosecutorial decisions. In the past, even the suggestion of White House influence was seen as scandalous.

But Blanche sang a completely different tune when asked about DOJ’s independence by Sen. Chris Coons on Wednesday.

“Is the Department of Justice that you are running independent from the White House?” the Delaware Democrat asked.

Blanche did not try to confirm or emphasize the independence of the Justice Department while under oath.

“The Department of Justice, like every single department in the executive, is part of the executive. I mean, Article II of the Constitution gives the power of the executive to President Trump,” Blanche said.

The acting attorney general went on to claim that the department operates “with integrity.”

“We certainly operate in the single mindset to serve the American people and do the right thing,” Blanche added. 

You will notice that Blanche's answer had little to do with the question put to him. That's a sure sign of obfuscation -- not what you want to see from someone testifying under oath before Congress. Blanche proceeded to meander down an even more tangled path, Ewall-Wice reports:

Blanche said that if he is confirmed, he would be “a member of the Cabinet” and noted that Trump could fire him whenever the president wants.

“We all serve at the pleasure of President Trump in this administration,” Blanche said.

Coons observed that he believed Blanche was Trump’s nominee to fill the seat after Attorney General Pam Bondi was fired because the president was unhappy with his former attorney general’s ability to secure convictions against perceived political enemies.

“I don’t know,” Blanche responded. 

Blanche might have good reason not to know about that, but he certainly should know about language in the DOJ Justice Manual on the subject of independence from the White House. Let's take a look at it,  straight from Section 8-1.600 -- Communication with the White House:

In order to promote and protect the norms of Departmental independence and integrity in making decisions regarding criminal and civil law enforcement, while at the same time preserving the President’s ability to perform his constitutional obligation to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed,” the Justice Department will not advise the White House concerning pending or contemplated criminal or civil law enforcement investigations or cases unless doing so is important for the performance of the President’s duties and appropriate from a law enforcement perspective.

That seems straightforward enough. The second round of Blanche's hearing comes today, and it would be interesting if someone were to ask Blanche if he is familiar with the above section of the Justice Manual and if he intends to abide by it. The American people need, and deserve, an answer to that question.

Blanche came into the hearing on the heels of a New York Times report that indicates he already was essentially acting as Trump's personal attorney -- an apparent violation of his oath of office. Ewall-Wice writes:

The day before Blanche’s Senate confirmation hearing, The New York Times revealed Blanche has been spearheading the president’s retribution campaign within the Justice Department.

Blanche was nominated and confirmed as Trump’s deputy attorney general after Trump was elected for a second term. Before that, Blanche worked as a criminal-defense attorney and represented Trump when he was tried and convicted of fraud in 2024. (Blanche served as a federal prosecutor for eight years before going into private practice and later becoming Trump's personal attorney.)

During his confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, Blanche was repeatedly accused by Democrats of acting as Trump’s personal attorney while serving in the role of acting attorney general rather than as the top law enforcement officer of the U.S. beholden to the Constitution.

Blanche did nothing to relieve them of their concerns or reject the accusation on Wednesday, and even let his views on his relationship with Trump slip in another revealing exchange with Republican Sen. John Kennedy (adding a touch of unintended humor to the proceedings.)

“Are you and President Trump friends?” Kennedy asked.

“I’m his lawyer,” Blanche responded without missing a beat.

“Was his lawyer—and now I’m the deputy attorney general," Blanche quickly amended, but it was already out there.

“I met him as his criminal defense attorney. I’m not sure that there’s very many people who’ve ever had a criminal defense attorney who calls that person their friend,” Blanche said.

But as Ranking Member Dick Durbin pointed out in his opening statement at the start of the hearing, Blanche has previously declared publicly on camera his loyalty to Trump.

At a press conference in April, Blanche said even if Trump nominated someone else to be attorney general, his message to the president would be “I will say, ‘Thank you very much. I love you, sir.’”

Todd Blanche already was facing opposition as attorney general nominee, but NY Times report shows he has been leading Trump's retaliation campaign

Confirmation hearings for attorney general nominee Todd Blanche are set for today and tomorrow, and when a vote is taken at a time to be determined, we will know if the United States has become a lawless, rogue state. We also will know if any Republican senators still have functioning spines. What are my guesses at the outcomes on these issues? They are grim. I suspect the rule of law, already on life support, will flatline when Blanche is confirmed as the nation's top law-enforcement official. As for Republican senators showing spine, I'm not counting on it.

How bad a nominee is Blanche? All you need to know is this: In private life, he was Trump's personal attorney -- and as acting attorney general upon the ouster of Pam Bondi -- he has proven that he still is acting as Trump's personal attorney. Is Blanche likely to act in line with his oath of office? Let's answer that question by looking at the oath he took when he became acting attorney general:

"I, Todd Blanche, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God." 

Does that say Blanche is to act affirmatively on any Trump whim? No. Does it say Blanche is to prosecute any perceived political enemy Trump wants prosecuted? No. As for the last sentence in the oath, does Blanche even believe in God? In a religious sense, I'm sure Blanche would say, "Of course I believe in God." But in a political sense, Blanche has proven he is "all Trump, all the time" -- and he "shall put no other god above Trump." Blanche is the ultimate political loyalist, and that is the No. 1 trait (the only trait) Trump wants in any nominee. Will Blanche serve Trump? Yes, to the absolute hilt? Will he serve the duties of his job and the needs of the American people? Are you serious? They will be no consideration in any decision he makes. The White House essentially admitted as much in releasing the following statement about Blanche's nomination:

"President Trump has a great relationship with acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and is very pleased with the job he’s doing so far. Todd Blanche is an American patriot who fearlessly fought against the Democrats’ unprecedented lawfare campaign on behalf of President Trump. The President’s entire team at the Department of Justice is doing a great job advocating for sanity, law and order, and policies that keep Americans safe."

Has an official statement ever contained that much mindless B.S. in one paragraph? I doubt it.

Blanche already looked like the worst AG candidate in U.S. history, but his look got even worse yesterday when The New York Times broke a story about emails that show Blanche is personally directing the effort to prosecute Trump's political enemies, apparently with no consideration for the constitutional standard of 'probable cause." A jointly published report at The Daily Beast and Yahoo! News examines the Times' findings under the headline "Emails reveal Todd Blanche spearheaded Trump's retribution campaign." Janna Brancolini writes:

Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has been personally leading President Donald Trump's revenge campaign against his perceived enemies, according to a bombshell new report released in the lead-up to his Senate confirmation hearing.

Supporters of Blanche, who previously served as Trump's defense attorney, claim he has served as an important check on retribution crusades launched by the president's most provocative attack dogs, including the DOJ's Ed Martin and acting director of national intelligence Bill Pulte.

But just a day before Blanche's confirmation hearing to serve as Trump's permanent attorney general, The New York Times revealed that rather than being a calming influence on the administration, Blanche has been spearheading the president's retribution effort within the DOJ. 

That work began last year, when he served as his predecessor Pam Bondi's top deputy, and continued after Bondi's ousting in April, according to emails obtained by the watchdog group American Oversight and shared with The Times. 

How bad does Blanche look in all of this. The emails show that Blanche was compromised as a deputy AG and as acting AG. Does anyone seriously believe he is going to rediscover his respect for the rule of law once he becomes AG? Remember this guy is "all Trump, all the time," and that speaks volumes about who his master will be as head of the DOJ. Brancolini writes:

In particular, Blanche has been tasked with enacting Trump's executive order purporting to end the "weaponization" of the U.S. government, part of a major drive to punish members of prior administrations who tried to hold Trump legally accountable.

In May 2025, Blanche diverted top lawyers from his office to the DOJ "anti-weaponization" group responsible for investigating Trump's enemies, giving him tight control over the cases, the emails reveal.

One of Blanche's aides was responsible for digging into the actions of special counsel Jack Smith, who prosecuted Trump for allegedly mishandling classified documents and attempting to overturn his 2020 election loss.

Another longtime Blanche aide was assigned to investigate Alvin L. Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney who secured convictions against Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records over his payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

A third Blanche aide led a team focused solely on Tina Peters, the Colorado elections clerk who served four years out of a nine-year sentence for violating state election laws in a bid to uncover "proof" of nonexistent fraud during the 2020 election. 

Here is a thought that seems to have never occurred to Blanche: Perhaps Trump (in the Stormy Daniels case) and his allies (Tina Peters in the Colorado voting case) ran afoul of the law because prosecutors made legitimate findings that laws had been violated, and Trump and Peters violated them. Brancolini writes:

Blanche also allowed Martin to personally oversee investigations into two of Trump's pet causes: the prosecutions of more than 1,500 Jan. 6 rioters—some of whom Martin had represented in court—and a probe into former President Joe Biden's autopen use.

But in May, Blanche removed Martin from his role with the anti-weaponization group. He had been concerned all along that Martin wasn't experienced or effective enough to do the job, the emails—which were handed over under the Freedom of Information Act—reveal.

Since then, the anti-weaponization group has ramped up its investigations and reports, even as regional U.S. attorneys' offices have begun trying to build a massive yet flimsy conspiracy case against Biden and other Trump adversaries, The Times reported.

Last week, a group of 1,205 Justice Department alums urged the Senate Judiciary Committee to reject Blanche's nomination, writing that "corruption and abuses… have defined" his tenure, and that he has "degraded" the DOJ's apolitical career workforce. 

Will senators listen? With Democrats, I suspect the answer is yes. They should be smart enough to know that Blanche is the quintessential Trump loyalist, and it's hard to imagine what any Dem might think he or she could gain by supporting Blanche. As for Republicans, they have proven they cannot govern -- and have little interest in governing -- so they are inclined to do whatever Trump wants. And Trump wants an AG he can fully control -- and that person is Todd Blanche. It's possible a handful of Republicans might display a conscience and vote no on Blanche. But I don't expect many to go that route.