Fox News White House correspondent Peter Doocy asked White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Wednesday if the administration believes voting Republican is a “threat to democracy.”
Ahead of the midterms, Democrats and the White House have warned about candidates who deny the legitimacy of the 2020 presidential election, and have called Make America Great Again (MAGA) Republicans “a threat to democracy.”
“Following up on your comment that there is an alarming number of Republicans who are saying they’re not gonna accept election results, does that mean that President Biden thinks it is a threat to democracy if somebody votes Republican?” Doocy asked.
“No, that’s a ridiculous question, no,” Jean-Pierre said.
“Why is that a ridiculous question?” he asked.
“Because the American people should have their right to vote for whomever they want. Voting is a sacred right, it is something that the president wants to protect at every turn, and he has done that. He has taken actions to protect the right to vote, and you see Democrats in Congress also doing the work to protect the right to vote,” Jean-Pierre said. “We are talking about mega-MAGA Republican officials who have been very clear about this, who say they are pro-police but then are also pro-insurrectionist. You cannot be pro-police and pro-insurrectionist. Who also say they want to defund the FBI. That is a problem.”
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Doocy then asked if Democrats and Republicans should be equally condemned for denying election results. The press secretary responded that the president will “call out any rhetoric” that threatens political violence, regardless of party affiliation.
“It doesn’t matter if there’s a D or an R after your name, he will call out any rhetoric that leads to potentially political violence or that calls for political violence … The president has always, always condemned political violence, it doesn’t matter, again, if you’re a Republican, or Independent, or a Democrat,” she answered.
Democrats have had a history of denying election results in the past presidential and gubernatorial elections. Democratic Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, who Biden endorsed, repeatedly denied the legitimacy of her loss to Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, and former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton asserted that former President Donald Trump was an “illegitimate president.”
The Fox News reporter challenged Jean-Pierre on whether it is still a democracy with Republicans in charge of at least one chamber of Congress.
“So President Biden thinks democracy can survive even if Democrats are not in charge of Congress,” Doocy said.
“The president is optimistic, you know this, Peter,” she said. “He is an optimistic person, and he understands that there are a majority of Americans out there who do not believe in denying an election. Who believe in actually protecting our democracy. There’s a majority of Americans who believe in strengthening our democracy … but as the President of the United States, he believes it is his duty, his responsibility, to call out this rhetoric, and that’s what he’s going to continue to do.”
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