‘Rigged Elections!’ President Trump Casts Doubt On California Results

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump doesn’t believe that Spencer Pratt really lost the Los Angeles mayoral primary.

“Not possible for Spencer Pratt to have lost the L.A. runoffs after the big lead he had,” Trump said on Monday afternoon. “3rd World Nation. Rigged Elections! Now they’ll be working on great guy Steve Hilton. Won’t have results for, possibly, TWO WEEKS, according to officials.”

Five days after the mayor election deadline, polls showed socialist candidate Nithya Raman pull ahead of Pratt, who had been running in second place ever since election night. Pratt and his supporters have responded skeptically, pointing out that Raman’s lead comes only after mail-in-ballot dumps over the past week moved the race in her favor.

Either Raman or Pratt will face Mayor Karen Bass in November’s election for Los Angeles mayor, and the Associated Press has not yet called who the winner is. Bass apparently wants Raman in the fight — not Pratt. In a statement issued moments after Raman was reported to take the lead, Bass issued a statement describing Raman as her “opponent.”

Pratt has not yet given up.

“Folks, we’re dealing with a fraction of a percentage point difference, there’s still hundreds of thousands of votes outstanding, and LA officials have given us the next 3 weeks to count,” he said in a social media post on Monday. “Let’s git-r-dun!”

Los Angeles Mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt is seen speaking with the media outside Don Antonio’s restaurant on June 02, 2026 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by HIGHFIVE/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images)

Trump, who previously told The Daily Wire that he’d “like to see [Pratt] do well,” said of Pratt in late May, “I heard he’s a big MAGA person. He’s doing well. I don’t know. You know, if you have a rigged vote out there, that’s the problem. The votes are rigged. You have a really rigged vote in California. You have all the mail-in ballots, everything else. Very hard to win, because the elections are very dishonest.”

And on Sunday, Trump promoted a post from Congressman Abe Hamedah, who wrote, “It’s clear, California is incapable of running free and fair elections consistent with our Constitution that guarantees a republican form of government for states. Federalize the election.”

“No way this could have happened,” the president said. “Rigged election!”

Trump has also suggested that Republican gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton is facing a rigged election — Hilton also started far ahead of his opponent but, following mail-in-ballot counting, has seen his Democrat opponents closing in.

“Has anybody been watching the CROOKED Election going on in California,” Trump asked over the weekend. “Two great Republican Candidates are being cheated, and so is America, which if the Dumocrats are able to fulfill their mission, great trouble and consternation will follow. Watch this ‘Election’ closely!!!”