Michael Flynn calls for Trump to suspend the constitution and declare martial law to re-run election

‘Only then can the winning candidate be accepted as legitimate’

With a fresh presidential pardon still warm, former national security advisor Michael Flynn has called on Donald Trump to suspend the constitution and declare martial law for the military to run a new election.

The retired general tweeted out a full-page ad that ran in The Washington Times that claimed the extraordinary executive actions were necessary to avoid the alternative of an imminent "shooting civil war".

Captioning the tweet "Freedom never kneels except for God [pray emoji, US flag emoji]", Mr Flynn linked to ad from a TEA Party-affiliated group called We The People Convention.

The 1,500-word manifesto invokes Abraham Lincoln's extraordinary use of presidential authority to suspend habeas corpus as it compares the more widely-known civil war with Antifa and Black Lives Matter attacking major cities with their anti-American agenda.

"Then, to advance their cause, these socialists are acting to “Defund the Police,” creating chaos and suspending the rule of law that protects millions of average, and particularly minority, Americans," the ad says.

"The results being massive increases in violent crime and deaths in our cities and the destruction of small businesses orchestrated by those politicians and leftist groups, many funded by domestic and international communists. We are literally under attack from within!"

President of the We the People Convention, Tom Zawistowski, said in a press release accompanying the newspaper ad that the group wanted to express its concerns that their rights had been infringed by the "massive" election fraud that stole the presidency for Joe Biden.

His claims echo the repeated allegations of election fraud that have come from the president since Mr Biden was projected to be the winner of the election almost four weeks ago.

A day after Mr Flynn tweeted out the calls for martial law, Mr Trump published a 46-minute video to Facebook calling on the Supreme Court to overturn the results in the key swing states that delivered the projected victory to the Democrats.

He also suggested a "re-vote" be held, as had been suggested in the ad on Tuesday that called for the military to run the re-lection.

“When the legislators, courts and/or Congress fail to do their duty under the 12th Amendment, you must be ready Mr President to immediately declare a limited form of Martial Law, and temporarily suspend the Constitution and civilian control of these federal elections, for the sole purpose of having the military oversee a national re-vote," the ad said.

"Only then can the winning candidate be accepted as legitimate by a true majority of We the People who must give our consent to be justly governed! Unfortunately we are at a point where we can only trust our military to do this because our corrupt political class and courts have proven their inability to act fairly and within the law."