Senior Republican senator accepts election was not rigged but refuses to call Biden president-elect

‘The president wants to see this process play out,’ Blunt says

GOP Senator Roy Blunt has admitted the 2020 election was not rigged and that former Vice President Joe Biden is “likely” to become the 46th US president in January.

But the Missouri senator repeatedly refused to call Mr Biden the president-elect in an interview with CNN’s Dana Bash on Sunday, as the leader of his party, Donald Trump, continues challenging the validity of the election results.

“The President wants to see this process play out,” Mr Blunt said.

“The president-elect technically has to be elected president by the electors. That happens in the middle of December,” the senator said, referring to the electoral college that is chosen to represent each state based on the results of its popular vote.

Mr Blunt agreed with the CNN host that the election was not “rigged” against Mr Trump.

“I don't think it was rigged, but I do think there were some things that were done that shouldn't have been done. And I think there was some element of voter fraud as there is in every election. But I don't have any reason to believe that the numbers are there that would have made that difference” in the outcome, Mr Blunt said.

He credited the Trump administration for bolstering election security against the very fraud the Trump campaign, without evidence, is claiming still happened.

When Ms Bash directly asked Mr Blunt if he had seen widespread evidence of voter fraud, the senator, a former Missouri secretary of state, indicated he had not seen enough evidence to reverse the results of the election.

“It's up to the president's lawyers to present that evidence, and at this point they haven't done it in a way that was acceptable to any court,” Mr Blunt said, highlighting the Trump campaign’s string of failures before federal courts challenging the results in several key swing states such as Pennsylvania, Michigan, Georgia, and Wisconsin — all of which broke for Mr Biden.

News networks called the presidential race for Mr Biden weeks ago. Several GOP lawmakers have called on the outgoing president to quit undermining faith in the integrity of the election, although Mr Blunt and other leaders have taken the track of appeasing Mr Trump’s last-ditch efforts until the results are officially certified.