WaPo:
A new internal report prepared by the Republican National Committee proposes creating a permanent infrastructure in every state to ramp up “election integrity” activities in response to perceptions within GOP ranks of widespread fraud and abuse in the way the country selects its leaders.
The report, prepared by the RNC’s “National Election Integrity Team” and obtained by The Washington Post, reveals the degree to which Republicans continue to trade on former president Donald Trump’s false claims that Democrats and their allies rigged his defeat in 2020.
The report suggests building a massive new party organization involving state-level “election integrity officers” and intensive new training models for poll workers and observers — all based on unsubstantiated claims that Democrats have implemented election procedures that allow for rigged votes.
Yet the report also acknowledges that the GOP’s obsession with election fraud has cost the party, most notably in 2021, when mistrust in elections contributed to a drop in Republican turnout in two U.S. Senate runoffs in Georgia, costing the party its Senate majority.
The report concludes that the party must continue building on efforts begun after that electoral disaster to restore Republican faith in their elections. But instead of combating misinformation about fraud, the report encourages the recruitment of staff and volunteers to monitor elections and the development of more aggressive legal strategies to “hold election officials accountable for violating the law.”