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Late in the weekend, a glimmer of hope arose from the City of Angels.
The election isn’t until November. But as more primary votes have come in, it looks like Spencer Pratt is losing.
However, some who are less pleased with this development are beginning to spin conspiracy theories about the votes.
The loudest voice among them belongs to none other than Donald Trump.
‘It’s happening again right now in California’
California is America’s largest state by population. Voting is a slow, deliberate process.
Because the state operates with a top-two voting system, all candidates are on the ballot in the primary. The two with the most votes will then face off in the general election this autumn.
After the first day of voting, with only a portion of votes tallied, incumbent Mayor Karen Bass was in the lead, with Spencer Pratt behind her, and progressive city council member Nithya Raman in third — and thus seemingly out of the race.
However, over the weekend, she surged ahead. With 83 percent of ballots counted, Raman surged to second place with 27.1 percent of the vote, over Pratt’s 26.7.
Ultimately, either party could end up facing Bass — who currently has 34.7 percent of the vote — in the general election.
On the Sunday, June 7 episode of Meet The Press, Trump repeated his proven lies about the 2020 election.
He then went on to claim that “it’s happening again right now in California.”
Trump claimed that Republican candidates were “dropping fast because it’s a rigged election.”
Welker repeatedly asked for evidence, but he simply claimed: “All I have to do is look.” That is, of course, not evidence.
“Do you think it’s appropriate that they have an election, and five days later, they’re nowhere close to picking a winner?” Trump asked.
What’s so funny about this is that for people who actually live in LA, Nithya is one of the few council member names people actually know because they’ve heard that name for years.
— Cody Ziglar (@yayforzig.bsky.social) June 8, 2026 at 3:15 AM
‘You’re either crooked or you’re stupid’
Welker’s attempt to explain how California’s voting process worked did not seem to interest him.
“No they’re crooked, just like you’re crooked, your press is crooked,” Trump accused without merit. “Meet the Press is crooked. And so is ABC. And CBS. And CNN.”
Projecting as hard as ever, Trump declared: “You’re either crooked or you’re stupid — you play right into their hands.”
He claimed: “You know that these elections are rigged, your network knows that they’re rigged.”
Trump continued to complain, yelling: “You’re a one-sided crooked network. Let’s call it quits because I’ve had enough.” And with that, he ended the interview.
As noted M&M’s enjoyer Tucker Carlson might ask: What’s happening? What’s going on?
It might be tempting to say that some people are believing conspiratorial nonsense because the California voting system is slow and cautious. There’s more to it than that, however.
Others might posit that to Trump and many like him, if they win, it’s fair, and if they lose, it’s because someone cheated. That may be an accurate depiction of how they see the world, but it isn’t ultimately the whole story.
While those are both factors, perhaps the biggest issue is that, if you aren’t familiar with how things work, everything looks like a conspiracy.
Scammers — as many have characterized Spencer Pratt, who has no known qualifications to hold office — thrive on identifying a problem and proposing a fake, yet easy-sounding solution to that problem.
For now, those of us who aren’t descending into a conspiratorial abyss can just wait for the rest of the primary votes to be tallied. And for the 1 out of every 11 Americans who lives there, they’ll also need to vote in November.
Donald Trump Blasts California Vote Count, Claims Election Is ‘Rigged’ … was originally published on The Hollywood Gossip.