WASHINGTON, DC – California Attorney General Rob Bonta recently sat down with MS NOW’s The Weekend to discuss the Trump administration’s attempt to interfere in statewide elections by spreading unfounded claims of voter fraud in the California primaries. AG Bonta also talked about how he and his fellow Democratic attorneys general are preparing to take action if Trump were to continue to meddle in the midterm elections.  

“As you know, the right to vote is fundamental. It’s the right from which all of the rights flow, and voting only works when voters can exercise that right without interference, intimidation, and fear,” AG Bonta said. “And Trump, unfortunately, has tried to impose interference, intimidation, and fear time after time. And we are going to protect the integrity of our elections, the safety, security, accuracy of those elections.”  

Key highlights: 

• “And with respect to the statements by the first assistant in the Central District of California about some of the investigations that they say they are engaged in, there are no details. There [are] no specifics. There is no specific allegation of any individualized active voter fraud and every count, recount, hand count, court case, an audit, has shown time and time again, not just in California, but throughout this country, that there is no widespread voter fraud. It is only a figment of the imagination of Trump and others who follow that conspiracy theory.”

• “[Democratic AGs] are assessing all of the potentially unlawful and actually unlawful actions of the Trump administration and preparing a response on behalf of the constituents of our respective states. We are better as a team than we are on our own, and we are committed to working together as co-equals, you know, sovereigns representing sovereign states each ourselves.”
• “And we believe that we owe our collective constituents readiness, preparedness, a plan, a plan of action for every single one of those potential scenarios. And so we have table topped and gamed out each of these scenarios. And we have a plan. We’re ready to move swiftly and quickly to block and stop any of these potential unlawful actions by the Trump administration. And we think that’s what we owe our constituents.”
• “The Constitution says that the time, place and manner of elections throughout the United States of America shall be determined by the states and also to a degree by Congress. The president, the executive branch has zero authority to dictate the time, place and manner of the elections.” 

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