‘The numbers are verifiably wrong’ — Trump insists after leaked phone conversation on ‘recalculating’ votes

US President Donald Trump has, again, insisted that the votes affirming Joe Biden of the Democratic Party as winner of the presidential election, are “verifiably wrong”.

Trump’s claim comes hours after a leaked conversation, in which Trump asked some election officials in Georgia to recalculate and help him find some alleged missing votes in the state.

“How can you certify an election when the numbers being certified are verifiably WRONG. You will see the real numbers tonight during my speech, but especially on JANUARY 6th. @SenTomCotton Republicans have pluses & minuses, but one thing is sure, THEY NEVER FORGET!” the US president said in a post on Twitter on Monday.

How can you certify an election when the numbers being certified are verifiably WRONG. You will see the real numbers tonight during my speech, but especially on JANUARY 6th. @SenTomCotton Republicans have pluses & minuses, but one thing is sure, THEY NEVER FORGET!

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— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 4, 2021

Meanwhile, in the leaked telephone conversation with Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s secretary of state, Trump asked the officials to “find 11,780 votes”.

Also on the call were Mark Meadows, White House chief of staff; Ryan Germany, Raffensperger’s office’s general counsel; and Jordan Fuchs, Georgia’s deputy secretary of state.

The call comes less than three weeks to the swearing-in of President-elect Joe Biden.

Trump has repeatedly disputed the results of the November 3 presidential election with claims that some of his votes were overturned in favour of Biden.

Biden won 306 electoral college votes against Trump’s 232 votes. Of the total 538 electoral college votes, an absolute majority of 270 or more electoral votes are required to elect the president and vice-president.

Even if Trump gets Georgia’s 16 electoral college votes, he still would not have the required numbers to win the election.

“So we’ve spent a lot of time on this, and if we could just go over some of the numbers, I think it’s pretty clear that we won. We won very substantially in Georgia. You even see it by rally size, frankly. We’d be getting 25 to 30,000 people a rally, and the competition would get less than 100 people. And it never made sense,” Trump said.

“So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state. So what are we going to do here, folks? I only need 11,000 votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break. The people of Georgia are angry; the people in the country are angry. And there’s nothing wrong with saying that, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated.”

Raffensperger, however, dismissed Trump’s claims, telling the president he (Trump) was being misled by information on social media.

“Well, Mr. President, the challenge that you have is the data you have is wrong. We talked to the congressmen, and they were surprised. We don’t agree that you have won. We believe that we do have an accurate election. Mr. President, the problem you have with social media, they — people can say anything.”

Following the telephone call, Trump tweeted: “I spoke to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger yesterday about Fulton County and voter fraud in Georgia. He was unwilling, or unable, to answer questions such as the ‘ballots under table’ scam, ballot destruction, out of state ‘voters’, dead voters, and more. He has no clue!”

Responding also in a tweet, Raffensperger wrote: “Respectfully, President Trump: What you’re saying is not true. The truth will come out.”