Donald Trump declares 'I won': the Presidential tweet that threatens chaos

Donald Trump tweeted he had won the election. Credit: AP

Nearly two weeks after the election, at just before midnight here, the President tweeted again.In some ways it was the most absurd and outrageous tweet of his presidency. And that, of course, is saying something.That’s because Donald Trump is now definitively claiming that he has won the election. Not that he may have been the victim of fraud, not that he is contesting the result.

The streets of Washington were packed with Trump supports - including many who identified themselves as members of the Proud Boys group. Credit: AP

No, this was a simple declaration he won re-election.If this was happening in another country, you would expect the US to be imposing sanctions or delivering stern diplomatic warnings.

Twitter of course had to place a warning against it, stating simply that “official sources called this differently”, and linking through to an article making clear that Joe Biden won the election. This follows a tumultuous weekend in Washington in which tens of thousands of pro-Trump supporters thronged the streets. A few hundred activists - largely far-right conspiracy theorists linked to InfoWars and the Proud Boys - caused trouble throughout the weekend, paralysing much of the area around the White House.I saw and heard it for myself. Trump supporters shouting, “no Trump, no peace!”  

Robert Moore reports from Washington as tens of thousands of pro-Trump supporters hold rallies to back his unsubstantiated claims he won he election.

How does this end?The President appears in no mood to concede. By saying that he actually won an election he clearly lost is to enter a world in which truth has no value.On Sunday, Barack Obama called this “truth decay”.It’s actually “truth destruction”.

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The whole edifice on which the country’s democratic system works is in peril. If a transition is never facilitated, if defeat is never acknowledged, if journalism is attacked, if the rules of the system are simply inverted, then America is not America.There must now be the possibility that Donald Trump will need to be physically evicted from the Oval Office and escorted off the White House grounds.This is the mad world we are now in. That absurd scenario is now being openly talked about 66 days before the Inauguration.