Trump says Republicans ‘should take over the voting’ and ‘nationalise’ US elections

US President Donald Trump has urged Republicans to “nationalise” elections and repeated his false claims of 2020 election fraud in a new podcast interview.

American elections are primarily run by state law, and voting has long been administered by local officials across the country.

“The Republicans should say: ‘We want to take over. We should take over the voting in at least 15 places.’ The Republicans ought to nationalise the voting,” Trump said during an appearance on the podcast of his former deputy FBI director, Dan Bongino.

His remarks come days after the FBI raided an elections office in Georgia to examine voting records from the 2020 election.

In the interview, Trump did not name the “15 places” where he thought Republicans should “nationalise” voting.

The president tied his desire to federalise voting mechanisms to his key agenda item of deporting undocumented immigrants from the US. “If Republicans don’t get them out, you will never win another election as a Republican,” he said.

While speaking to Bongino, Trump also referenced the FBI’s raid in Georgia’s Fulton County, saying that “you’re going to see some interesting things come out”.

Trump narrowly lost the state to Joe Biden in 2020. He has repeatedly said his loss was due to fraud – an unsubstantiated claim.

Trump faced two criminal indictments related to alleged election interference in Georgia; a federal case that ended after he returned to the White House last year, and a Georgia state racketeering case that fell apart. He denied any wrongdoing.

In the new podcast interview, Trump claimed he won the 2020 election “in a landslide” and said, without evidence, that people “vote illegally”.

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that the president “believes in the United States Constitution, however he believes there has obviously been a lot of fraud and irregularities that have taken place in American elections”.

Leavitt said that Trump’s podcast remarks were in support of the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act, which would require voters to show documentary proof of citizenship at the time of registration.

Proponents say it will help reduce voter fraud, which experts say is rare, and ensure non-citizens do not vote illegally.Critics argue it will place unnecessary barriers on US citizens seeking to register to vote.

Non-citizens already cannot vote in US federal elections for president and Congress and in most statewide races.

Last week, the FBI said it was conducting a “court-authorised law enforcement activity” at the Fulton County Election Hub. Fulton County officials said that the government’s warrant “sought a number of records related to 2020 elections”.

Some local officials expressed anger at the raid.

“This is an assault on your vote,” Fulton County Commissioner Mo Ivory said.

Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard has confirmed that she was present for the raid, saying that Trump personally asked her to be on-site.

Gabbard’s first comments on the matter came in a letter that was sent to a group of senators on Monday, saying her presence was “executed under [her] broad statutory authority to coordinate, integrate, and analyze intelligence related to election security, including counterintelligence (CI), foreign and other malign influence and cybersecurity”.

In the letter, Gabbard confirmed that there had been a call in the wake of the raid between FBI agents on the ground and Trump. The call, which was first reported by the New York Times, raised some eyebrows as it is unusual for a president and on-the-ground law enforcement to directly communicate in such a case.

Gabbard said she “facilitated a brief phone call for the president to thank the agents personally for their work. He did not ask any questions, nor did he or I issue any directives”.