‘Reckless’ and ‘stupid’: Trump Jr calls for ‘total war’ over election results

President Donald Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr, is facing backlash after urging his father to “go to total war” over the incoming results of the 2020 election. 

With Mr Trump facing the possibility of being a one-term president in his knife-edge race against Democratic challenger Joe Biden, his son pressed his father to take action in a tweet, while also repeating the president’s baseless claims of election fraud. 

“The best thing for America’s future is for Donald Trump to go to total war over this election to expose all of the fraud, cheating, dead/no longer in state voters, that has been going on for far too long,” Mr Trump Jr said in a tweet. 

The post was quickly hidden by Twitter, which warned that “some or all of the content shared in this Tweet is disputed and might be misleading about an election or other civic process”. 

Mr Trump Jr quickly lashed out at the social media company for hiding his tweet, writing: “Twitter is censoring and flagging this of course."

“Why would we not want to find out if these things exist? If they don’t then we will find nothing and people could maybe regain some faith in the process which doesn’t exist now,” Mr Trump Jr wrote, adding: “Why would they be against finding potential fraud?”

The president’s eldest son, who has pushed conspiracy theories on Twitter in the past, was quickly condemned for his tweets, with his call for “total war” branded “reckless”. 

“Unfortunately, no one on the GOP side of things —at least no one with any clout—has the fortitude to tell Don Jr. to get a grip,” journalist Sam Stein wrote in a tweet.  

Calling for “total war”, Stein wrote, “is beyond reckless. And someone should try and shut it down.”

"When your supporters are buying guns, and turning up at vote counts with guns, many would argue its incitement to violence to be urging ‘total war over this election’," political journalist Mehdi Hasan warned in a tweet, appearing to refer to a recent incident in which Trump supporters armed with firearms crowded outside a building where ballots were being counted.

Officials in Arizona’s Maricopa County  were forced to close the facility to the media and public over safety concerns after Trump supporters, many of them armed, gathered outside the building.

Meanwhile, in Clark County, Nevada, registrar of voters Joe Gloria said he was concerned for the safety of his staff as protesters gathered outside an election counting building there on Wednesday. 

“I can tell you that my wife and my mother are very concerned for me,” Gloria said, according to Forbes. “I am concerned for the safety of our staff.”

Joe Walsh, the founder of the Bravery Project, which was launched by current and former Republicans “organizing boots on the ground to defeat Trumpism,”  also took aim at Mr Trump Jr over his comments, branding the president’s eldest son “stupid”.

“Stupid little Jr calling for a war," Walsh wrote. "He and his daddy and all the rest of them will have blood on their hands.”

Mr Trump Jr, however, was not alone in appearing to risk inciting violence, with Mr Trump’s campaign team also sending out an email to supporters calling on them to “FIGHT BACK” over the baseless claim that Democrats have tried to “STEAL” the election.

“I’m calling on YOU to step up and FIGHT BACK,” the email, which was addressed from Mr Trump himself, said. “Your support is critical right now.”

Speaking from the White House on Thursday, Mr Trump again repeated his claims that a count of legally cast ballots would find him to be the winner of the US election.

“This is a case where they're trying to steal an election. They're trying to rig an election," the president claimed, without basis. 

The Trump campaign has been contacted for comment.