There's bad news for anyone out there who thought Joe Biden's presidential victory would usher in an era of normalcy and bipartisan compromise.
A new poll from the Washington Post found that most Republican lawmakers are taking after the GOP's de facto head in refusing to acknowledge the results of the presidential election. The Post surveyed all 249 Republican members of Congress and only 25 were willing to admit that Biden won the White House.
There are positives to be found in the poll —if you really squint. It seems that most Republicans don't believe Donald Trump won either. In the slapdash manner of the entire Trump administration and its current election lawsuit gambit, congressional representatives of the GOP seem to want to keep their plates spinning above all else in the hopes that something will intervene before they have to admit defeat. Only two representatives told the Post they think Trump won his re-election bid with the remaining 221 refusing to answer.
Alongside this pressing question, the Post also asked if they supported Trump's 11th hour antics and whether or not they would accept Joe Biden as the rightful president after the Electoral College meets on December 14. Nine elected officials said they oppose the lawsuits, eight said they support them with over 200 declining to answer. The final question around Biden's legitimacy offered a more promising answer: 30 representatives said they would accept his presidency to only two die-hards who said they would oppose it.
In the days immediately following his election loss, Trump was uncharacteristically quiet. That period of silence has come to an end in recent days as Trump has resumed regularly posting to Twitter and holding rallies promoting the lie that the election was stolen from him. After news broke of the poll, Trump threatened the unnamed members of Congress who said they were willing to accept Biden's win.
