After a couple more of these, my priors switched -- I assume that accusations about Trump are always misleading unless I get the full context.
The Raffensperger call seemed pretty bad from the descriptions, even by Trump standards, so I went and listened to it and read the transcript. I was unsurprised to find that the portrayal of it, as "find me votes" meaning "create fake ballots to elect me" is entirely inaccurate. Yes, he did offer a number of bizarre conspiracy theories about why the election outcome was fraudulent, and Raffensperger did an excellent job, for each one, of both acknowledging the theory and showing that he had taken it seriously and investigated and found no evidence or outright disproven it. The call ended not with Trump saying "make up those votes or else" but with Trump saying, essentially "I'll follow up with more evidence for voter fraud".
If you have listened to the call or read the transcript and come away thinking "wow, Trump really tried to rig the election" then I don't know what to tell you. It's just plainly obvious that he did not do that, and I struggle to even comprehend how that could be a reasonable conclusion.
This is probably just sea-lioning, but I went back to re-read that transcript on the chance that this was an earnest comment and my previous view was colored.
There is no other way to read this transcript than Trump trying to strong-arm them into refusing to certify the election results. He says "find me this number of votes" multiple times, and the direct context was "you're facing criminal charges for this if you don't do as I am saying".
Here's a few of the relevant snippets, with context, for anyone reading this far:
---- > Trump: But I won’t … this is never … this is … We have some incredible talent said they’ve never seen anything … Now the problem is they need more time for the big numbers. But they’re very substantial numbers. But I think you’re going to find that they — by the way, a little information, I think you’re going to find that they are shredding ballots because they have to get rid of the ballots because the ballots are unsigned. The ballots are corrupt, and they’re brand new and they don’t have a seal and there’s the whole thing with the ballots. But the ballots are corrupt.
And you are going to find that they are — which is totally illegal, it is more illegal for you than it is for them because, you know what they did and you’re not reporting it. That’s a criminal, that’s a criminal offense. And you can’t let that happen. That’s a big risk to you and to Ryan, your lawyer. And that’s a big risk. But they are shredding ballots, in my opinion, based on what I’ve heard. And they are removing machinery and they’re moving it as fast as they can, both of which are criminal finds. And you can’t let it happen and you are letting it happen. You know, I mean, I’m notifying you that you’re letting it happen. So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have because we won the state.
> Trump: No, but this was. That’s OK. But I got like 78 percent in the military. These ballots were all for … They didn’t tell me overseas. Could be overseas too, but I get votes overseas too, Ryan, you know in all fairness. No they came in, a large batch came in and it was, quote, 100 percent for Biden. And that is criminal. You know, that’s criminal. OK. That’s another criminal, that’s another of the many criminal events, many criminal events here.
Oh, I don’t know, look Brad. I got to get … I have to find 12,000 votes and I have them times a lot. And therefore, I won the state. That’s before we go to the next step, which is in the process of right now. You know, and I watched you this morning and you said, uh, well, there was no criminality.
But I mean, all of this stuff is very dangerous stuff. When you talk about no criminality, I think it’s very dangerous for you to say that.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/03/politics/trump-brad-raffenspe... ----
You really 'struggle to comprehend how that could be a reasonable conclusion'? There's no hint of a threat anywhere in there, in your opinion?