What I say today I preface by saying that I have been a conservative Republican all of my adult life.

I have taken the oath of office to uphold the laws and the constitution eight times and served as Secretary of State and certified two presidential elections.

As Secretary of State I tried to reassure people that Ohio was a state where it was easy to vote and hard to cheat.

I did the first ever post election audit on voter fraud & suppression & showed that nobody who wanted to vote was denied & while fraud existed, is was very rare.

But during that time there were many voices who tried to undermine election confidence by alleging voter suppression in Ohio, a state where you could vote for a month without ever leaving home.

Those claims sewed the seeds of distrust and were nonsense.

In this context I want to provide reassurance that this election was not stolen.
 
That does not mean the election laws and processes used in many states were as good as Ohio’s, but there is a difference between an inefficient process and a stolen election.

In the final days of his presidency, President Trump should honor the Constitution and the traditions of America and ask all who support him to honor the peaceful transition of power.