Pointing back to Florida in 2000, Buchanan endorses Trump’s refusal to concede to Biden

U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan on Tuesday joined with other Republicans who have endorsed President Donald Trump’s challenge of some of the results of last week’s presidential election.

In a tweet, Buchanan compared Trump’s refusal to concede the race to President-elect Joe Biden to former vice president Al Gore’s refusal to concede to George W. Bush in 2000. It took more than a month for Bush to be declared the projected winner of that election because of Gore’s challenge of the result in Florida and attempt to force more recounts.

“President Trump has every right to legally challenge the vote in jurisdictions where irregularities have been reported, just as Al Gore did in 2000 when he refused to concede to George Bush until 37 days after the election,” Buchanan said.

The tweet including photographs of a British newspaper’s front pages on the Bush-Gore race.

Bush was declared the winner in Florida, by 537 votes, after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in his favor in a lawsuit brought by Gore.

Trump and his allies have yet to offer evidence of fraud or other irregularities in last week’s vote and counting of ballots as they challenge the results in Georgia, Pennsylvania and elsewhere.

None of those margins in those states are as narrow as the one by which Bush beat Gore in Florida in 2000.

Buchanan’s tweet was his first public comment on Trump’s refusal to concede to Biden.