Critics say Trump voting remarks were ‘sane-washed’ (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Do you guys know what sane-washing is? It's when somebody says something crazy and someone else tries to make it sound less crazy what the person said, usually by misrepresenting the crazy thing that somebody said. White House Press Secretary Caroline Leavitt just tried to do that with something President Trump said on Monday when he suggested that Republicans should take over voting in 15 places where he traditionally has lost so that Republicans, and maybe him, can win. Let me show you how it works. Here's a comment that President Trump made on a podcast on Monday.

[00:00:36] Speaker 2: The Republicans should say, we want to take over. We should take over the voting in at least many, 15 places. The Republicans ought to nationalize the voting.

[00:00:48] Speaker 1: So that would be unconstitutional. The U.S. Constitution says that states are in charge of how they administer and count the votes in federal elections. But regardless of that, Caroline Leavitt, earlier today, suggested the President was merely advocating for this national legislation called the SAVE Act. Here she is.

[00:01:07] Speaker 3: What the President is suggesting, and I just spoke to him about this, is that Republicans and Democrats in Congress should pass the SAVE America Act. This piece of legislation is going to ensure that states are abiding by federal election law by removing noncitizens from their voter rolls. In addition, the SAVE America Act will require voter ID to vote, and it will require proof of citizenship to register to vote.

[00:01:32] Speaker 1: So, yeah, the President is pushing for that legislation, but that's not what he was talking about in that podcast on Monday. And, in fact, when our own Caitlin Collins asked the President what he was talking about and what the 15 places were, he didn't even mention the SAVE Act or national legislation. He talked specifically about, in his view, all the corrupt elections in these Democratic-leaning or battleground areas, and he even specifically cited some of the places where he thought Republicans should take over elections. Take a listen.

[00:02:03] Speaker 4: A state can't run an election. I think the people behind me should do something about it. You see some of these states about how horribly they run their elections, what a disgrace it is. Take a look at Detroit. Take a look at Pennsylvania. Take a look at Philadelphia. You go take a look at Atlanta. Look at some of the places that, horrible corruption on elections.

[00:02:24] Speaker 1: Now, look, I'm sure it is much easier to defend legislation than it is to defend President Trump suggesting that Republicans should seize control of the voting in 15 battleground or Democratic areas. But that doesn't make it true, just like it doesn't make it true to claim that President Trump did not mix up Greenland and Iceland when three different times he called Greenland Iceland.