Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., on Sunday declared there was a "great deal of evidence of fraud" and illegal election law changes that merit a "thorough investigation."
In a contentious exchange on ABC News' "This Week" with George Stephanopoulos, Paul said liberal journalists are saying anybody that believes the election was stolen is a "fool" to bring up the subject.
"There are two sides to every story. George, you're forgetting who you are," Paul said. "You're forgetting who you are as a journalist if you think there's only one side.
"You're inserting yourself into the story to say I'm a liar because I want to look at election fraud and I want to look at secretaries of state who illegally changed the voter laws without the permission of their state legislatures. That is incontrovertible, it happened.
"And you can't just sweep it under the rug and say, 'oh, nothing to see here,' and 'everybody is a liar' and 'you're a fool if you bring this up.' You're inserting yourself into the story. A journalist would hear both sides, and there are two sides of a story."
Paul said the election case brought in Wisconsin proved his point that alleged fraud is worth investigating. A federal judge in Wisconsin dismissed a lawsuit filed by Trump challenging Joe Biden's victory there.
"In Wisconsin, tens of thousands of absentee votes had only the name on it and no address," Paul said. "Historically those were thrown out, this time they weren't. They made special accommodations. It's a pandemic. They changed the law after the fact. That's wrong; that's unconstitutional."
"I won't be cowed by liberals in the media who say, 'there's no evidence here and you're a liar if you talk about election fraud,'" he continued. "Let's have an open debate; this is a free country."
Paul agreed former Attorney General William Barr said there was no widespread evidence of fraud rising to the level to overturn the election, but Paul called that determination "a pronouncement."
"There's been no examination, thorough examination of all the states to see what problems we had and see if they could fix them," he argued.
"I voted to certify the state [Electoral College votes] because I think it would be wrong for Congress to overturn that," he said.
"At the same time, I'm not willing to sit here and say, 'everybody on the Republican side is a liar and there's no fraud,'" he insisted. "There were lots of problems and secretaries of state who illegally changed the law and that needs to be fixed, and I'm going to work hard to fix it. The media today say all Republicans are liars. There are two sides to every story."
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