Trump decries weaponized probes against political figures: ‘Worse than ballot stuffing’

Former President Donald Trump is decrying the relentless investigations launched against him and his supporters, saying they are a form of political cheating worse than ballot stuffing.

Trump assailed the chronic investigations he has faced for seven years during his first rally of the 2024 campaign season in Waco, Texas on Saturday night, and then in a subsequent post on his Truth Social platform.

“The new weapon being used by the Democrats to cheat on Elections is criminally investigating a candidate, bad publicity and all, by the DOJ and their local henchmen at A.G. & D.A. OFFICES,” he wrote on Truth Social. “They make lives miserable, destroy their families and friends, regardless of their innocence, which makes little difference to these Radical Left Maniacs.

”It is worse than ballot stuffing and media manipulation. We must stop them cold!”

During a rousing event in Waco, Texas, Trump cast the next presidential election as a battle to defeat "sinister forces" seeking to topple America and vowing to muster a "quantum leap" in Americans' living standards if returned to the White House.

With multiple criminal investigations bearing down from New York to Georgia, Trump said his enemies were afraid to defeat him at the ballot box so they've weaponized law enforcement against him and his supporters.

"For seven years, you and I have been taking on the corrupt, rotten, and sinister forces trying to destroy America," he told thousands of cheering fans, who kicked off the rally in new fashion by playing Trump's No. 1 best selling music hit "Justice for All" that overlayed his recital of the Pledge of Allegiance with a rendition of the Star Spangled Banner recorded by Jan. 6 defendants in prison.

The 45th president called the 2024 election "the final battle" and the "big one" that would decide whether America remained a free country or slipped toward socialism.

"Between our borders, our elections, and the weaponization of law enforcement, a banana republic, that's what we've become," Trump said.

"You put me back in the White House, their reign will be over, and America will be a free nation once again," he added.

Trump used the speech to excoriate the performance of Joe Biden on the global stage and the declining American economy, while explaining the policies he would pursue if reelected to defend parents' rights, decouple the U.S. supply chain from China and reinvigorate an economy bled down by inflation, rising interest rates and bank failures.

"It's not enough just to stop the forces tearing down America," he said. "It's time to start talking about greatness for our country again. Our objective will be a quantum leap in American standards of living."

Among the domestic solutions he promised, an effort to restore parents' right to choose whether their children get vaccinated or wear masks to school. "I will not give one penny to any school that has a vaccine mandate or a mask mandate," he said.

On foreign policy, he vowed to drastically reduce America's reliance on foreign energy sources and China's manufacturing by waging a manufacturing renaissance.

"I will implement a four-year plan to phase out all Chinese imports of essential goods and gain total independence from China," he promised.

Both during and before the rally, Trump taunted Democrat prosecutors investigating him and suggested their intentions weren't legal but political.

"What kind of person can charge another person, in this case a former President of the United States, who got more votes than any sitting President in history, and leading candidate (by far!) for the Republican Party nomination, with a Crime, when it is known by all that NO Crime has been committed, & also known that potential death & destruction in such a false charge could be catastrophic for our Country?" he wrote on his Truth Social platform ahead of arriving in Texas.

The rally was held during the 30-year anniversary of the Waco siege that lasted nearly two months before the attack on the Branch Davidian compound that resulted in 86 deaths. The Trump campaign insists that the rally has nothing to do with that anniversary.

Trump's campaign spokesperson said that Waco was the "ideal location" because of its proximity to Texas' major metropolitan areas and its infrastructure to host "a rally of this magnitude."

"President Trump is holding his first campaign rally in Waco in the Super Tuesday state of Texas because it is centrally located," spokesman Steven Cheung said.