Former president Donald Trump said Friday that he won Minnesota in 2020, despite Democratic presidential candidates having controlled the state for more than four decades.
“I thought we won it in 2016. I thought we won it in 20 – I know we won it in 2020,” he said during a speech at the Minnesota GOP dinner in St. Paul. Trump added: “We have to look at those votes.”
The false claim was the latest in a wave of election denial and conspiracy comments the former president has made since his 2020 presidential loss.
President Joe Biden won Minnesota in 2020 with 52.4% of the state’s votes, compared to Trump’s 45.3%. The difference between the two candidates was more than 233,000 votes.
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton won Minnesota in 2016, albeit by a smaller margin than Biden. Clinton received 46.9% of the votes of Minnesotans, while Trump received 45.4%.
Democrats have won Minnesota in every presidential election since 1976. The cycle before that, the state went to Republican Richard Nixon.
During his speech, Trump claimed he would “win this state” in November.
Trump previously said of Minnesota in an interview published by KSTP on Wednesday: “I thought I won easily in 2020.” In an interview that aired on KNSI Radio in March, Trump first said of Minnesota in 2020: “I thought we won it last time. I will be honest. I think we won it,” before adding: “We didn’t. you’ll be fine.”
Biden campaign spokesman James Singer called the former president “unhinged over his 2020 loss.”
“In 2020, Joe Biden defeated him by 7 million votes, including by more than 230,000 in Minnesota – and in November, Joe Biden will beat him again because Americans deserve better than a weak, desperate and pathetic loser like Donald Trump as their commander in chief,” he said. Singer said in a statement.
Trump also made a similar false claim about Wisconsin last month.
“We won this state by a wide margin. It turns out we won this one,” Trump said at a rally.
However, Trump lost the state in 2020 by more than 20,000 votes. He won in 2016, becoming the first Republican to win the state since Ronald Reagan in 1984.
Polls show that Biden and Trump are still in a tight race. An NBC News poll conducted in April found that 44% of registered voters favored Biden and 46% favored Trump in a head-to-head matchup.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
