Trump's Unhinged Speech Wasn't About 2020 — It Was About 2026

By continuing to push the "SAVE" Act while falsely alleging election fraud, Trump is laying the groundwork to steal the 2026 Midterm election—we must stop him

On Thursday night, Donald Trump delivered what can only be described as an unhinged primetime address to the American people, alleging volumes of evidence that China helped steal the 2020 presidential election.

There’s only one problem: that evidence does not exist. But make no mistake, his speech wasn’t about 2020. It was about him stealing 2026. And it is more critical now than ever we activate, organize, and punch back with meaningful action. Here’s how. Let’s Address This.

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Trump’s Big Lie Continues to Grow

Trump claimed a government investigation found that hostile foreign actors could “change votes on a deep level that could not be detected even with a deep audit,” and further alleged that “there are 278,000 foreigners illegally registered to vote” in the United States.

This is pure fabrication. Zero evidence supports either claim. Not one document, witness, data set, or forensic finding. Nothing—because nothing exists to find. But note how Trump phrased his allegation—fraud “on a deep level that could not be detected.” This is not how facts work—it’s how propaganda thrives.

And Trump knows it is a lie. Perhaps someone should remind Trump that he personally shut down not one but two of his own voter fraud commissions during his first term—commissions he initially demanded—because they returned findings of no evidence of fraud. He then filed 61 lawsuits following the 2020 election across multiple states and jurisdictions, challenging results before judges appointed by Democrats and Republicans alike. He lost all 61. Not because of judicial bias or a rigged court system. But because in every case his legal team could not produce the evidence the law requires—because it does not exist.

And then he ignited an insurrection.

And the sad truth is, that insurrection perpetuates to this day, only this time it is far more dangerous. Here’s what Trump is trying to do, and how we fight back.

Trump Is Trying to Steal the 2026 Midterms

First, if we follow Trump’s claim to its logical conclusion, it works against Trump. It means that under Trump’s own presidency, hostile Chinese hackers allegedly committed the most sophisticated and consequential act of election fraud in American history, and Trump, with the full intelligence apparatus of the United States government at his disposal, failed to stop it, failed to detect it, and failed to prevent it. And given that extraordinary display of executive incompetence and national security breach, he wants the American people to reward him with even more power.

Ahem. No.

Or how bout this. Apparently it was the Democrats’ fault. By that genius claim, Democrats failed to cheat to win in 2016, failed to cheat to win in 2024, and then committed an insurrection on January 6 on the one elected they did manage to win. Anyone who believes any of this gobbledygook (that’s an extremely technical legal term I learned in law school) needs a formal intervention.

The reality is that Donald Trump is trying to steal the 2026 election, which is why he added another demand to pass the so-called SAVE Act during his unhinged diatribe. As I have written before, the SAVE Act will return the United States to Jim Crow America in its voter restrictions. It will decimate voter access for women, for Black and brown people, and for low income people.

We must stop its passage, and just as importantly, we must double down on our actions to expand voter access. The most common question I receive is, “how can we substantively respond to this attack on voting rights?”

My answer: We follow in the footsteps of the civil rights giants who came before us to fight for the right to vote in the first place. This is why we launched 1000 Miles to Memphis earlier this week—and why I want you to choose one, two, or all three actions below to help us register 100,000 voters in the South and nationwide.

The Urgency of This Moment—And Why I Announced 1,000 Miles to Memphis This Week

Earlier this week I announced the launch of 1,000 Miles to Memphis—a 30-day, 1,000-mile voting rights march from Nashville through Atlanta, Birmingham, and Jackson, ending at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stood with striking sanitation workers in 1968.

We announced this march before Trump’s Thursday night speech. And Trump’s Thursday night speech is precisely why this march cannot wait.

Trump will not stop. He will continue to manufacture election fraud narratives without evidence—not because he believes them, but because he needs them. This means our response cannot be confined to online outrage. We must protest with our feet, our registrations, our donations, and our organizing. That is what 1,000 Miles to Memphis is built to do—and with your partnership we can deal a substantive blow to fascism.

Here is how you join us:

1. Register to vote. Be one of the 100,000 voters we are committed to registering before fall midterm deadlines close. After you register, send the registration link to your friends and family. I am asking everyone reading this to commit to a specific, measurable act of civic solidarity: get 10 people in your network who have never voted before to register. Ten people. That is the ask. Take that challenge—and post about it after registering using hashtag #1000Miles.

2. March with us. At the link below you can sign up to walk a leg of this 1,000-mile route with us—to place your feet on the same Southern roads where civil rights icons bled and were beaten and sometimes died for the very right to vote that Trump is now trying to ban. The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. Join us.

3. Donate. No movement sustains itself on moral clarity alone. Resources are what turn organizing energy into registration infrastructure, into legal protection, into the logistical backbone of a month-long march across five cities. Especially if you cannot be present in person—donate and help fuel this movement to protect voting rights where they are most under attack.

The route for 1000 Miles to Memphis

The Pattern That Explains Everything

Trump will not stop until he is stopped. He will continue to allege voter fraud because he is a cheater in everything he does.

He cheated on all of his wives. He cheated his fellow New Yorkers through decades of financial fraud for which he was held civilly liable. He cheated the contractors, laborers, and working people he hired to build his properties—refusing to pay them for their work. He cheated American taxpayers and was convicted of 34 felony counts by a jury of his peers. He tried to cheat the 2020 election by inciting an insurrection.

And now—having exhausted every other avenue—he is attempting to cheat the American people by manufacturing an election fraud narrative, for one purpose and one purpose only: to lay the groundwork to cheat once more and steal the 2026 midterm elections before they happen.

We cannot let that happen.

Register. March. Donate. Organize. Let’s take our fight for democracy to the ballot boxes—and bring everyone we know with us.

And finally, support Let’s Address This. Independent, people-funded media that covers these critical issues in real time, without corporate censorship or billionaire control, is itself an act of resistance. An act that requires your partnership to sustain.

The right to vote was paid for in blood on Southern roads. It must not be surrendered to a man who has never in his life respected a rule he did not write for his own benefit.

#1000Miles | #CourageNow

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Qasim Rashid is a human rights attorney, President of Just Win Humanity, and host of Let’s Address This—a platform dedicated to human rights, voting rights, and the accountability that corporate media refuses to provide. Subscribe, share, and let’s remain relentless in our mission for a more perfect Union.