If the President’s supporters believe him and dismiss everyone else as “fake news”, then his baseless claims about the election being stolen could have very real consequences, writes Michael Rowland.

For a man who has turned the presidency into a high-rating reality TV show, Donald Trump’s disappearance from public view since election night has been quite unnerving.
Not nearly as unsettling as his baseless claims of electoral fraud and his false declaration of victory during that rambling early morning appearance in the East Room of the White House. But odd, nonetheless.
Sure, there was the steady flow of tweets demanding the count be stopped, but was the President, steeped in numbers care of his business background, using the time away from the cameras to have a long, hard look at how the electoral maths was shaping up?
As it turned out, Trump had spent the time stewing over an election he baselessly believes has been stolen from him.
When he did finally step up to the podium in the White House press briefing room today, it quickly became clear the President was untethered from reality.
US election: what’s happening now
Trump falsely declared that if the “legal” votes were counted, he would easily win the election.
There is no evidence of any “illegal” votes.
None. Zip. Nada.
Protesters have rallied in Detroit, Michigan with megaphones announcing, “We will let the truth be known, Donald Trump won the election”.(ABC News: Emily Clark)
Election officials in the key swing states have been at pains to stress the counting process has been completely transparent and aboveboard.
No-one has produced any credible proof the election has been compromised.
No proof of the “mystery ballots” Trump claimed had suddenly appeared and heavily favoured the Democrats.
US election 2020
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The President again sought to undermine the integrity of postal ballots that have long been a feature of US elections.
He said there was something suspicious about the majority of postal votes in the key states heavily favouring Joe Biden.
Bear in mind, the President had spent months urging his supporters not to vote by mail and instead turn up in person at polling stations.
Is it any surprise his faithful supporters have done exactly what he’s told them to do, with the postal votes as a result skewing in the Democrats’ favour?
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It was such a litany of lies that the big US TV networks and cable network MSNBC pulled the plug on Trump’s address.
MSNBC’s Brian Williams uttered words he thought he’d never have to say:
“Here we are again in the unusual position of not only interrupting the President of the United States, but correcting the President of the United States,” he said.
“There have been no illegal votes that we know of, there has been no Trump victory that we know of.”
CNN’s Anderson Cooper was more direct:
“That is the President of the United States. That is the most powerful person in the world. We see him as an obese turtle on his back flailing in the hot sun, realising his time is over.”
I know Trump’s supporters will believe him
It’s one thing to be loose with the truth.
Trump has done that more than 20,000 times over the course of his presidency, according to the Washington Post’s count.
US election essentials
We venture into more dangerous and darker territory when the President deliberately seeks to undermine America’s entire democratic system.
That is now where this country is at.
Vice-President Mike Pence, who was notably absent from Trump’s side today, refused to repeat the claims of electoral fraud, insisting only that every legal vote be counted.
Republican senator Mitt Romney, not one of Trump’s greatest fans, pointed out the counting of every vote was at the heart of America’s democracy.
Senior Republicans are realising they now have to choose between a man seemingly determined to trash America’s cherished institutions and the very rule of law itself.
Ellen Weintraub, the chair of the US Federal Election Commission, used Twitter to urge Trump to step back from the precipice.
The worrying thing is that many of Trump’s supporters (and there are now more of them than was the case in 2016) will blindly accept his conspiracy theories and refuse to countenance a peaceful transition of power if Biden does eventually win.
Already, pro-Trump demonstrators have been gathering at vote counting venues.
And I have discovered firsthand on my travels here that supporters of the President too easily throw the words “fake news” back at you when you hit them with basic facts.
These are often fine, upstanding Americans whose world-view has been distorted by the falsehoods their leader routinely spouts.
Thankfully, there has so far been minimal election-related violence.
But with a Trump supporter, Georgia State politician Vernon Jones, tonight standing beside one of the President’s sons talking about the “fight” and the “battlefield” and (figuratively) “getting ready now to start shooting”, then it is easy to see tensions getting inflamed even further.
America is at the crossroads.
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Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, John Bolton, says the President “won’t leave graciously” if he loses.