Former Republican strategist Rick Wilson, a longtime GOP operative who co-founded the anti-Trump Lincoln Project, predicts that President Donald Trump is deploying baseless claims of voter fraud and election rigging to preemptively challenge an anticipated Democratic surge in the November midterms that could cost Republicans control of the House and potentially the Senate.

Wilson offered his assessment after MS NOW anchor Eugene Daniels questioned why Trump continues to prioritize passage of the SAVE Act — a Republican-backed bill that would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register for federal elections — and promote discredited narratives about election integrity rather than pursuing policies that might improve voters' daily lives.

"This is a setup for watching a Democratic wave hit the country this fall after failing completely to address affordability," said Wilson. "He thinks affordability is a joke and a fraud. But I also think he's setting it up in the fall to say '[Speaker] Mike Johnson don't seat these newly elected Democrats. It's all a fraud.' I think he's looking to raise that level of chaos and uncertainty and give Republicans something to cling to after the election is over. The shenanigan here is to deny Democrats their victory."

Wilson's reference to refusing to seat newly elected Democrats invokes a rarely used constitutional power: Article I, Section 5 grants each chamber of Congress the authority to judge the qualifications of its own members, though legal scholars note that successfully blocking certified election winners would face steep judicial hurdles.

Trump has a well-documented record of challenging legitimate election outcomes in an effort to retain power. He refused to concede his 2020 loss to Joe Biden and continues to assert that the election was stolen by Democrats, despite the fact that no judge — including those Trump himself appointed — ruled in his favor across numerous lawsuits.

As recently as June, Trump was also undermining local races in California, claiming without evidence that state officials had sabotaged candidates he had endorsed in mayoral contests.

Wilson further argued that Trump's inability to accept defeat is dragging the Republican Party toward significant electoral losses, as the former president insists on relitigating the 2020 election even as voters grow increasingly frustrated with the party's alignment with his agenda. Polling throughout 2024 has consistently shown economic concerns like inflation and housing costs ranking among voters' top priorities, a disconnect Wilson sees as politically damaging for Republicans who have followed Trump's lead away from pocketbook issues.

"Trump has an arrogance about him, that he's the only thing that matters," said Wilson. "And, you know, he earned that from [Republicans] because they've treated him like he's the only thing that matters. But I've never seen a president of either party so willing to throw his own people under the bus, and so willing to start blaming them for things that clearly either couldn't be accomplished or were counterproductive or were off message politically."

"They've tried, in some cases, to save him from himself, and he doesn't want it," continued Wilson. "He doesn't want to be saved. He doesn't want to have help. He just wants them to obey him because he believes that they are his political property at this point. And I think it is really extraordinary to watch how much venom he has for them versus how much venom he has for the Democrats."