Former President Donald Trump said during the CNN presidential debate that he would accept the results of the 2024 race in November if it is a "fair and legal and good election" — before proceeding to repeat a discredited allegation of voter fraud when he lost four years ago.
CNN debate moderator Dana Bash asked Trump three times whether he would accept the 2024 election results. He did not directly answer the question the first two times, but on her third attempt, Trump said in part: "If it's a fair and legal and good election, absolutely."
"I would have much rather accepted these, but the fraud and everything else was ridiculous — and if you want, we'll have a news conference on it in a week, or we'll have another one of these in a week," Trump said, appearing to refer to another debate with President Joe Biden.
Trump did not provide more specific criteria that would lead him to accept the results.
Trump has refused to publicly accept that he lost the 2020 presidential race against Biden. The former president has made repeated and baseless allegations of widespread voter fraud, and virtually all of the dozens of legal cases filed by his campaign and his allies have been dismissed or withdrawn.
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The presumptive Republican nominee's unproven claims of a rigged election and his reaction to his defeat in 2020 have stoked anxiety about how he would respond to another loss.
Trump was also pressed on his actions on Jan. 6, 2021, the day some of his supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol. He did not directly condemn the violence of that day or apologize for his rhetoric in the days leading up to the riots.
"On Jan. 6, we were respected all over the world, all over the world we were respected," Trump said. Then, referring to Biden, he added: "Then he comes in and we're now laughed at."
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