Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) issued a striking warning on Tuesday: by lying about the size of Kamala Harris campaign events, Donald Trump is gearing up to deny the 2024 election results.

The Vermont senator weighed in after Trump falsely claimed over the weekend that Harris is using artificial intelligence to fake images of thousands of people at her campaign rallies, and that nobody showed up to one in Detroit.

Donald Trump may be crazy, but hes not stupid. When he claims that nobody showed up at a 10,000 person Harris-Walz rally in Michigan that was live-streamed and widely covered by the media, that it was all AI, and that Democrats cheat all of the time, there is a method to his madness, Sanders said in a statement.

Clearly, and dangerously, what Trump is doing is laying the groundwork for rejecting the election results if he loses, he added. If you can convince your supporters that thousands of people who attended a televised rally do not exist, it will not be hard to convince them that the election returns in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and elsewhere are fake and fraudulent.

Trump has reportedly been frustrated by the enthusiasm and media attention for Harris in recent weeks, complaining about having to face her in November instead of President Joe Biden . Hes been stewing about her crowd sizes online and fantasizing that Biden will somehow attempt to wrest back control of the presidential nomination at next weeks Democratic convention in Chicago.

Trumps allies have been urging him for weeks to stay focused on Harris record in Bidens administration and the progressive stances she took during her 2020 Democratic presidential primary bid, to little avail.