Former president Donald Trump lashed out Monday at Sen. Mike Rounds (S.D.), calling him a “jerk,” a day after the GOP senator said the 2020 election was “as fair as we have seen” and dismissed Trump’s widely debunked allegations of extensive voter fraud.
“We looked at over 60 different accusations made in multiple states,” Rounds said. “While there were some irregularities, there were none of the irregularities which would have risen to the point where they would have changed the vote outcome in a single state.”
He added, “The election was fair, as fair as we have seen.” Republicans, Rounds said, “simply did not win the election.”
“Moving forward — and that’s the way we want to look at this — moving forward, we have to refocus once again on what it’s going to take to win the presidency,” he said.
In a statement Monday, Trump doubled down on his false allegations of voter fraud, accused Rounds of being a RINO — Republican in name only — and said he would never endorse the South Dakota Republican again. Rounds doesn’t face a reelection race until 2026.
“Is he crazy or just stupid?” Trump said of Rounds. “The only reason he did this is because he got my endorsement and easily won his state in 2020, so now he thinks he has time, and those are the only ones, the weak, who will break away. Even though his election will not be coming up for 5 years, I will never endorse this jerk again.”
Rounds, Trump added, is a “weak and ineffective leader” who, along with Democrats, is not making it easy “for our Country to succeed.”
Rounds stood by his comments, issuing a statement Monday afternoon saying he was disappointed by Trump’s criticism but not surprised.
“The facts remain the same. … The former president lost the 2020 election,” Rounds said, a reality underscored by the congressional certification of Biden’s win last January.
“As a Republican Party, our focus should be on what lies ahead, not what’s in the past,” Rounds said. “Elections are about growing support for your party, not further dividing it. Attacking Republicans certainly isn’t going to result in a winning formula. Neither is telling citizens not to vote. If we are going to win in 2022 and 2024, we have to move forward together.”
Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), who’ve been vocal about their dismissal of Trump’s false fraud claims and conspiracy theories, defended Rounds on Twitter.
“Mike Rounds speaks truth knowing that our Republic depends upon it,” Romney tweeted Monday.
Romney then listed a number of prominent Republicans who have acknowledged that Biden won the 2020 election, among them Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and Sens. John Thune (S.D.) and Ron Johnson (Wis.). Johnson, despite demanding an investigation into alleged election “irregularities,” has said multiple times he has not seen “anything” that could convince him that the results of the 2020 election should be overturned.
Kinzinger mocked the former president’s statement on Rounds and called him a “snowflake.”
“Let’s get you some milk and a blankie :(," Kinzinger said to Trump. “Remember, you’re special and everybody knows it!”
Thune fielded questions about Rounds from reporters at the Capitol on Monday. He began his response by joking about how he himself has been on the receiving end of attacks by Trump.
“I say to my colleague, welcome to the club,” Thune said.
He added, “I don’t think that re-litigating and rehashing the past is a winning strategy.”
“If you want to be a majority in January 2023, we’ve got to get out and articulate what we’re gonna do with respect to the future the American people are going to live in, and the things that they care about when it comes to economic issues, national security issues. … Rehashing 2020 isn’t gonna get us there,” Thune said.
In the ABC News interview, Rounds — who voted to acquit Trump in his impeachment trial last year — didn’t rule out supporting him if he runs for president again in 2024, saying he would “take a hard look at it.”
Rounds also said Trump could still be prosecuted if the Justice Department were justified in doing so.
“Every single person who is accused of a crime is considered innocent until proven guilty. We all know that. The same thing with the former president,” Rounds said. “So, if they think they have got that, they can bring the evidence forward. In my opinion, they haven’t done that yet. And it’s going to be up to them to make that case. But that shield of the presidency does not exist for someone who is a former president.”
Rounds was not the only prominent conservative to dismiss Trump’s false claims of fraud Sunday. Fox News’s Brian Kilmeade, one of the hosts of “Fox & Friends,” told the network’s “Media Buzz” that Trump has to “learn to lose.”
“If you did, in fact, get screwed out of this election, put together an A-team list of lawyers ― not the ones we witnessed ― and show us the districts and show us how,” Kilmeade said. “I have not seen any of that.”
Paul Kane and Felicia Sonmez contributed to this report.
