MILWAUKEE — In an interview with TMJ4 News Wednesday, Sen. Ron Johnson acknowledged that President Trump lost the election but continued to call for investigations into alleged voter fraud - allegations that have been proven baseless in courts across the country and here in Wisconsin.
The ranking Republican senator did condemn the violence and lawlessness that erupted at the U.S. Capitol, when hundreds of Trump supporters rushed into the facility and where one woman was shot to death. The violent mob has since been subdued, but the incident has shaken some people's faith in the peaceful transfer of power in the executive branch - which was the purpose of Congress's session Wednesday.
"I abhor all kinds of lawlessness, I condemn it. Never should have happened," Johnson tells TMJ4's Charles Benson. "Peaceful protests are one thing. This was not a particularly peaceful protest, or lawful protest."
Against questions regarding if President Trump stoked his supporters into such violence - and if Johnson helped spread those emotions - Johnson denied. The senator primarily focused his time on his calls to investigate alleged voter fraud.
"What I've been talking about is the reality of the situation, that tens of millions of Americans are suspicious of the result of this election. In the end, they have a lot of reasons to be suspicious: the dramatic increase in absentee ballots.. the fact that the Democrats pushed the envelope and tried to weaken controls of absentee balloting - even though we ended up with double the number. The fact that observers were barred from actually doing their job from observing... there are all kinds of troubling allegations," Sen. Johnson tells us.
Elections officials have confirmed across the country that there is no evidence of voter fraud. Dozens of lawsuits seeking to overturn the election were also knocked down in courts, including in Wisconsin.
While Johnson did not bring up specific evidence of voter fraud, he said there are "all kinds of evidence that might point to proof" of election fraud, thus requiring more investigations, especially by state legislatures, according to Johnson.
What appears to be Johnson's bottom line: "This is an unstable state of affairs in our country, where you have a large percentage of the American population who are not viewing this as legitimate," Johnson says, in reference to the election.
Sen. Johnson also acknowledged that the Electoral votes, in the end, will go to President-elect Joe Biden.