Rep. Madison Cawthorn Calls US Elections ‘Stolen’ and Warns of ‘Bloodshed’ in Video Deleted From Facebook
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A video of Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) falsely calling U.S. elections “rigged” and the Jan. 6 Capitol rioters “political prisoners” was removed from Facebook on Tuesday.
“The things that we are wanting to fight for, it doesn’t matter if our votes don’t count,” said Cawthorn at a county Republican event on Sunday. “Because, you know, if our election systems continue to be rigged and continue to be stolen, then it’s going to lead to one place — and it’s bloodshed.”
The Macon County Republican Party in North Carolina posted the video, which has since been removed from Facebook. It is unclear whether Facebook or the county party deleted the video.
Cawthorn also said that he is willing to take up arms against his fellow Americans in order to combat voter fraud even though there is no evidence there was mass voter fraud in the 2020 election.
“I will tell you, as much as I am willing to defend our liberty at all costs, there is nothing that I would dread doing more than having to pick up arms against a fellow American,” he said. “And the way that we can have recourse against that is if we all passionately demand that we have election security in all 50 states.”
Cawthorn spokesperson Luke Ball told The Washington Post on Monday that Cawthorn was “in no way supporting or advocating for any form of violence.”
“In his comments, Congressman Cawthorn is CLEARLY advocating for violence not to occur over election integrity questions,” said Ball. “He fears others would erroneously choose that route and strongly states that election integrity issues should be resolved peacefully and never through violence.”
Additionally, Cawthorn referred to the Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6 as Congress was tallying Joe Biden’s presidential victory as “political hostages” and “political prisoners.”
“The big problem is we don’t actually know where all the political prisoners are,” he said. “And so if we were to actually be able to go and try and bust them out — and let me tell you, the reason why they’re taking these political prisoners is because they’re trying to make an example, because they don’t want to see the mass protests going on in Washington.”
