Obama tears into Trump over ‘rigged’ election claim, asks him to quit ‘whining’

Washington D.C., Oct. 19 : President Barack Obama on Tuesday branded Donald Trump's claims of a rigged election as destructive to American democracy, asserting that the Republican presidential nominee was whining about an invented conspiracy.

"You start whining before the game's even over?" Obama said during a news conference in the White House Rose Garden, adding that Trump's claim is "not based on facts", CNN reported.

Following two bland debates and a significant drop in poll numbers, Trump and his team have continued to fuel claims that the US election system is "rigged," Trump has urged his supporters to monitor polling sites for potentially ineligible voters attempting to cast ballots.

Reacting to the developments, Obama stated that there's "no serious person out there who would suggest somehow that you could even rig America's elections." Further claiming that Trump's warnings could affect the faith in the US political system, the President said, "One way of weakening America and making it less great is if you start betraying those basic American traditions that have been bipartisan and have helped to hold together this Democracy now for well over two centuries," He further slammed Trump's remarks as reflective of an "unpresidential" attitude, declaring again that the Republican nominee's temperament was disqualifying.

"It doesn't really show the kind of leadership and toughness that you'd want out of a president. You start whining before the game's even over? If whenever things are going badly for you and you lose you start blaming somebody else? Then you don't have what it takes to be in this job," Obama said.

"I have never seen in my lifetime or in modern political history any presidential candidate trying to discredit the elections and the election process before votes have even taken place.

It's unprecedented," he added. However, Trump has at times unabashedly donned the label of "whiner," telling CNN in an interview last year, he is "the most fabulous whiner." Advising the flamboyant businessman to stop whining and go try to make his case to get votes, Obama asserted that, "and if he got the most votes, then it would be my expectation of Hillary Clinton to offer a gracious concession speech and pledge to work with him in order to make sure that the American people benefit from an effective government, and it would be my job to welcome Mr.

Trump, regardless of what he said about me, or my differences with him on my opinions, and escort him over to the Capitol, in which there would about peaceful transfer of power.

That's what Americans do.".

Source: ANI