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Comment by timmytokyo | Hacker News Reader

You're glossing over January 6. There are few things more damning of the American electorate than their willingness to vote for a man who tried to use a coup to stay in power. The rest of the world sees it. And they'd be stupid to trust that Americans wouldn't do something so stupid again.

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But he didn’t. Trump didn’t sieze control of the military, there was no column of tanks moving towards Washington, just some angry fans rioting against his wishes (see the BBC lawsuit for manipulating trump’s speech of you think otherwise).

I think otherwise. [0]

The deck across the board is consistently stacked in Trumps favor in terms of domestic adjudication, often times by people he appointed, the system is hopelessly corrupt.

- [0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/dec/31/jack-smith-h...

You could make a case that January 6th was a catastrophe.

But a Trump-led coup? That’s quite a reach. I’m sure Trump got a thrill from the show of support. But I don’t believe even Trump thought those protestors could stage a successful a coup and overthrow the U.S. government. It’s fantasy.

The way Trump thinks the world works, why the hell not? He thinks the government of Norway is the one who decides who gets the Nobel Peace Prize... He thinks he ended 8 wars (ok this might be him talking out of his ass, as usual, but do we know that for sure?)

Nobody thinks that the Trump supporters that stormed the capital could have overthrown the government. The coup attempt was much simpler - Trump wanted his supporters to interrupt the certification so the states could use alternative electors to circumvent the results of the election.

Trump tried to get false electors to be used for counting the vote, changing the outcome the election by having states like Georgia and Pennsylvania vote as if Trump had won these states. Because he was too incompetent to organize this quickly he needed to delay the certification on January 6th, which the mob did accomplish.

He just couldn't get a few key people on board with this.

What exactly is this if not a coup?

Vice President Pence would disagree with you.

The only places I see that Trump 'tried to use a coup to stay in power' is far left commentary and online political discourse. Same exact thing as calling him a pedo.

It seems impossible to talk about him without resorting to wild reaching claims because he is the most guilty of doing the same thing.

Please tell me what trying to convince states to send false electors who would vote for Trump even though he lost their states and trying to prevent the certification of the election to either allow the false electors to be used or to throw the election to the state delegations should be called if not a coup.

He most clearly is a criminal, racist pedo.

People should shun anyone that voted for him

Trump used to wander into the dressing room of Miss Teen USA, walking in on undressed minors intentionally.

Calling him a pedo is not a wild-reaching claim. Claiming he did the above for anything but sexual gratification from minors is.

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