Mitt Romney Compares Trump's Stolen Election Bluster To WWE

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) on Sunday said Donald Trump ’s ongoing lying that he won the 2020 election is “like WWF,” comparing the former president’s return to rally events with the lurid theatrics of staged wrestling entertainment.

Trump held a rally in Ohio Saturday, during which he again repeated false claims that the presidential election was rigged against him, telling supporters  it was “the scam of the century and the crime of the century.”

“I do think it’s important for each person to speak the truth and to make clear that the ‘Big Lie’ is exactly that,” Romney told CNN ’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union” when asked if more Republicans should call out those lies.

Romney said he was concerned that Trump’s attacks on the American electoral system could serve as ammunition for autocratic nations against democratic ones, leaving “an impact on the cause of democracy and freedom around the world.”

But in the U.S., Romney added, he believed that there was increasing recognition that Trump’s bluster is “a bit like WWF,” ostensibly referring to World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), formerly known as World Wrestling Federation (WWF). Trump was sporadically involved with a number of WWE storylines between the late 1980s and early 2000s and is listed in its Hall of Fame .

“It’s entertaining, but it’s not real,” he said. “And I know people want to say, yeah, they believe in the ‘Big Lie’ in some cases, but I think people recognize that it’s a lot of show, and bombast. But it’s going nowhere.”

He noted that no credible sources have vouched for Trump’s claims of fraud, which he was spouting even before the election and on election night.

“Did he hear it from the Justice Department? No. Did he hear it from the intelligence community? No. So where did he hear it from? The MyPillow guy? Rudy Giuliani? What are their sources of information?” he asked. “It’s pretty clear the election was fair, it wasn’t the outcome the president wanted, but let’s move on.”

Romney, an outspoken Trump critic, was the sole Republican senator to vote for Trump’s conviction at his first impeachment trial. He was one of seven in his party who did so at the second trial, on the charge of inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.