Donald Trump vows to ‘fight like hell’ to remain in White House

US president Donald Trump vowed to “fight like hell” to keep the White House as he deepened the Republican division over presidential succession on the eve of a critical Senate election in Georgia.

Beginning Monday morning with a series of tweets and concluding in the evening with a long, rambling campaign rally, Mr Trump attacked members of his own party who accepted Joe Biden’s election victory and sought vice-president Mike Pence’s help in overturning the result.

A joint session of Congress, to be presided over by Mr Pence, is expected on Wednesday to certify Mr Biden’s electoral college win, adding a hint of desperation to Mr Trump’s campaign. Although the vice-president’s role is normally ceremonial, the US president called on Mr Pence to “come through for us” and challenge the vote result.

“They’re not taking this White House, we’re gonna fight like hell,” Mr Trump said, adding: “I hope our great vice-president comes through for us. He’s a great guy. Of course if he doesn’t come through I won’t like him quite as much.”

The US president’s increasingly frantic efforts to stay in power have created a febrile atmosphere in Washington and stoked new concerns for a smooth transition on inauguration day.

This is all easily, provably false. Yet the president persists, and by doing so undermines Georgians’ faith in the election system

Mr Trump also visited Dalton, Georgia, in the northwestern corner of the state, on Monday night in a bid to boost Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, two Republicans defending their Senate seats in a pair of pivotal run-off races.

The US president repeated his unfounded allegations of voter fraud in the state and lashed out at Republican state officials, including Brian Kemp, Georgia’s governor, and Brad Raffensperger, the secretary of state, for confirming Mr Biden’s narrow victory on November 3.

“I’m going to be here in a year and a half and I’m going to be campaigning against your governor and your crazy secretary of state, I guarantee you,” Mr Trump said.

The tensions with Georgia’s state government escalated when at a press conference on Monday, Gabriel Sterling, a top Georgia election official, accused Mr Trump and his allies of peddling debunked conspiracy theories in an effort to change the state’s presidential election’s result.

Mr Sterling said the president’s legal team had edited a video to suggest vote tampering during the November poll and spread other verifiably false allegations, including switched votes by the state’s voting machines and shredded ballots.

“This is all easily, provably false. Yet the president persists, and by doing so undermines Georgians’ faith in the election system,” Mr Sterling said.

Despite fears that open intraparty warfare could cripple the party’s hopes of holding on to the state’s Senate seats, and with it partisan control of the upper chamber, Mr Trump has ramped up attacks on Senate Republicans who acknowledged Mr Biden’s victory. Writing on Twitter on Monday, he called the lawmakers members of a “surrender caucus” who would go down in “infamy” as “weak and ineffective guardians” of the nation.

Thirteen Republican senators, led by Ted Cruz of Texas and Josh Hawley of Missouri and including Ms Loeffler, have said they would object to Mr Biden’s win based on unsubstantiated allegations of voter fraud. Many other Republicans, including longtime Trump allies, are expected to accept the election result — triggering the president’s wrath.

But Rob Portman, senator from Ohio, earlier on Monday joined the chorus defying Mr Trump, saying he would not challenge to Mr Biden’s certification. Arkansas senator Tom Cotton — a typically reliable conservative on Capitol Hill — also said he would not join the other Republican objectors, drawing the president’s ire.

“The constitution created a system for electing the president through the electoral college that ensures the people and the states hold the power, not Congress. I cannot support allowing Congress to thwart the will of the voters,” Mr Portman said. 

Mr Trump’s protracted defiance of the election results has also prompted warnings from business that some Republicans were threatening democracy by attempting to oppose certifying the presidential election results. 

“Efforts by some members of Congress to disregard certified election results . . . undermines our democracy and the rule of law and will only result in further division,” said Tom Donohue, chief executive of the US Chamber of Commerce, the business lobby.

Almost 200 business leaders signed a separate statement from the Partnership for New York City, warning that attempts to thwart certification of the results “run counter to the essential tenets of our democracy” and would distract from…