Carol Moseley Braun Discusses Georgia Runoff Election

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: I just wonder what you might say about how these Republicans on the state level who are being pressured by the president are actually standing up, much more than your colleagues in the Senate.

FMR. SEN. CAROL MOSELEY BRAUN (D-IL): I would say, shame on them. It’s a cult. And there’s no question that our democracy depends on truth and rule of law and trust. And this president is undermining all of those things, and that’s why I suggested that sedition is not too strong a word to describe the call that he made to the secretary of state of Georgia. He is trying to undo an election that he lost. And that’s just as plain and simple. And that that’s — the secretary of state was very clear. He’s counted and recounted and recounted the numbers and the numbers make it very clear that Donald Trump lost Georgia. Now, why he lost Georgia, we — scholars will be debating that for years. But he did. He lost Georgia. He didn’t have enough votes. It’s just that simple. And so, he should just be gracious or find the grace to just go away and stop claiming election fraud without any substantive proof of that. It’s an assault on truth. It’s an assault on democracy. It’s an assault on our democratic institutions. And why he’s doing this? I can’t tell you. I mean, it’s just — it’s astonishing to me.

AMANPOUR: It’s also about power, isn’t it, and maintaining power, and that’s why the runoff in Georgia is so obviously important. I don’t know what you’re hearing and what polling you’re looking at, but they are saying that early voting suggests that Democrats are in the lead in these two Senate runoff votes which are happening tomorrow. What do you predict and what will it mean no matter who wins?

BRAUN: Well, let me say this at the outset. Anybody who makes predictions in political campaigns is crazy.

AMANPOUR: OK.

BRAUN: Because if there’s one thing you can’t predict, it’s an outcome of an election. Elections have uncertain outcomes. But having said that, I’m hopeful that both Mr. Ossoff and Reverend Warnock win because they have certainly spoken to the people of Georgia and done the leg work to win their support and win their votes. Having said that, by the way, and this is a digression kind of, Ms. Amanpour, and that is, I do not understand why the Democratic Party let Alabama go. I mean, quite frankly, you know, the old bird in the hand versus two in the bush, they are beating themselves up over the two in the bush and we had a senator from Alabama that the Democratic Party nationally did nothing to support. And he couldn’t raise a penny. The word from the very beginning was that he did not have a chance, but he was already in the Senate. It’s like, why wouldn’t you protect that as opposed to or in addition to going after these two additional seats.