Ben Ginsberg WaPo oped:

Bring on the audits.

Really. As a Republican election lawyer who has participated in more than 30 post-election recounts, contests and audits, I am extremely confident: They won’t find anything. The massive fraud that former president Donald Trump claims tarnished the 2020 election has been and will remain illusory — because it didn’t exist.

But audits, I believe, can be the friend of sanity, helping everyone in the political process, especially the Republicans who understand that convincing their voters that elections are hopelessly rigged is no way to win elections.

Denying reality is not a successful electoral strategy. My argument to Republicans is simple: In the end, Trump’s elections-are-rigged message is going to hurt not only our democracy but also Republicans more than it hurts Democrats.

So to the extent that some of those who have bought into Trump’s delusional claims of a stolen election can be dislodged from this view by the repeated conclusions of the audits he himself has called for, my advice is: Bring it on. Welcome them with open arms. The furies have already been unleashed. And if there’s a better plan to dispel the “big lie” out there, no one’s described it.

The status quo is not sustainable, Trump is corroding American democracy with his unproven charges of fraudulent elections. Almost 30 percent of the electorate — and an astonishing 66 percent of Republicans — say they buy into Trump’s “big lie.” Constant fact-checking and reprobation by mainstream media outlets and good-government groups have not budged that number.

It’s time to call Trump’s bluff. Let’s stop decrying the wasteful idiocy of the Arizona audit (or quote-unquote “audit,” as it became universally known due to its sloppy procedures). That was conducted by Cyber Ninjas loyal to Trump yet unable to come up with anything more than 360 additional votes for Joe Biden and easily refutable charges about illegal voters. Let’s have more: Wisconsin, Pennsylvania — even states Trump won comfortably such as Ohio and Texas (especially puzzling since Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton already spent more than 22,000 staff hours fruitlessly searching for fraud).