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Republicans weighing in on Venezuela’s “election” found themselves in an unfamiliar position on Monday: They had to argue that the candidate who got more votes and would have been rightfully elected in a fair election should be president of the country.
This is a stark reversal from the past 3.5 years, when they helped Donald Trump, who lost the 2020 election by 7 million votes, perpetrate his Big Lie.
On Sunday, Venezuela’s dictatorial leader Nicolás Maduro proclaimed himself the winner of an “election” that did not deserve its name.
Even though independent observers were disinvited from monitoring the election, there were reports of widespread irregularities.
In the end, Maduro claimed to have defeated his challenger Edmundo González… even though pre-election and exit polling had shown the latter to be ahead by double digits.
US lawmakers from both sides of the aisle expressed their deep concern and outrage over the outcome.
In the case of Republicans, that is more than a bit hypocritical.
Without ever presenting a shred of evidence, many of them have spent the past three years saying that the 2020 election was somehow stolen from Trump, who, like Maduro, was the incumbent at the time and tried to use the levers of power to stay in office.
While Republicans seem to have been ok with that in 2020, now they are not.
“For too long, Nicolás Maduro and his thugs have deprived the Venezuelan people of the choice for new leadership by attacking his political opponents, using violence and threats in a desperate attempt to hold onto power over a people that hate him,” wrote Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) in a letter to President Joe Biden.
Scott, of course, was one of eight senators who voted to overturn the 2020 election results.
At the time, it would have been fair to say this about Trump (and Scott): “For too long weeks now, Nicolás Maduro Donald Trump and his thugs enablers in Congress and his riotous mob have deprived the Venezuelan American people of the choice for new leadership by attacking his political opponents, using violence and threats in a desperate attempt to hold onto power over a people that hate him just don’t like and overwhelmingly voted against him.”
And then there is Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), who also supports the Big Lie and tried to deny Biden the presidency he rightfully won.
“Maduro lost the election in Venezuela badly, then simply declared victory anyway. He is an illegitimate dictator,” he stated.
Apparently, irony is not a thing in Florida.
