Ty Cobb predicts address will set stage for election challenges
Ty Cobb, a lawyer who coordinated President Donald Trump’s legal response to the special counsel investigation of his campaign’s ties to Russia during Trump’s first term, told PBS Newshour on Thursday that he fears the president’s scheduled primetime address is intended to “add to the predicate that he needs to declare an emergency at or about the time of the elections.”
Cobb, who has become a critic of Trump, said in the interview that he believes the president will try “anything” to disrupt the November midterm elections, which he said Trump’s party is widely expected to lose, opening the door to a third impeachment. “Steve Bannon and Todd Blanche have suggested that there will be ICE agents at the polls, I think that that’s a virtual certainty, whether that will include the National Guard or not, we don’t know, but anything to intimidate minority voters, particularly immigrant voters,” Cobb said.
Cobb also said he thinks the president is looking for an excuse “to try to seize voting machines as Trump wanted to do in 2020.” He added that he expects Trump to do “everything he can to try to prevent the peaceful transfer of power, the election of Democrats, and do whatever he can to remain in power and to keep his cronies in powers, so that he can continue doing what he thinks he’s allowed to do as president, which is anything he wants.”