News Information and Media Site: Johnson defends threats to challenge Biden's election ... Fauci pushes back on Trump's criticism of Covid death toll

From NBC's Ben Kamisar

If it's Sunday, "people are saying" it.

That's an old standby for President Donald Trump — justifying an unfounded claim by pointing to the fact that "people are saying" it.

And that's the standard a group of Senate Republicans, which includes Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, are using to underpin their threat to object to President-elect Joe Biden's victory.

During a combative interview Sunday, Johnson said he and his allies are calling for an election audit because "we have an unsustainable state of affairs in this country where we have tens of millions of people who do not view this election result as legitimate."

But courts have rejected dozens of election challenges in recent weeks, and there's been no evidence of widespread fraud that could change the result of the presidential election.

And while Johnson identified the "unsustainable state of affairs" in America, he said Republicans were not responsible for it.

Instead, Johnson blamed the toxic stew brewing in the country on Democrats, for their four year opposition to Trump, and on the media, for its coverage of the Russia investigation.

The contentious interview on Sunday's show could be a preview of what the post-Trump scramble for the soul of the party will look like, particularly as the president, who continues to float a 2024 presidential bid, hardly retreats to the sidelines.

Click on the photo below to watch the full interview.

Fauci to Trump: These Covid deaths are real

Shortly before Dr. Anthony Fauci appeared on Sunday's show, President Donald Trump once again cast doubt on America's Covid-19 death count.

Here's what Fauci had to say about that:

"All you need to do, Chuck, is to go into the trenches, go into the hospitals, go into the intensive care units and see what is happening. Those are real numbers, real people and real deaths."

—Dr. Anthony Fauci on "Meet the Press."

December was the deadliest month for the pandemic in America — more than 77,000 people died and 6.4 million contracted the virus.

And Fauci warned that the pandemic "could and likely will get worse in the next couple of weeks," or "at least maintain this terribly high level of infections and deaths" in the coming weeks as America feels the full effects of travel during the Christmas holiday.

Click on the photo below for more from Fauci.

TWEETS OF THE DAY: Stacey Abrams joins "Meet the Press"

ICYMI: How QAnon made its way into Congress

Once a fringe phenomenon, the QAnon conspiracy theory is exploding online, boosted in part by both President Trump and some House Republicans, as well as the power of social media.

Click on the photo below to watch more on how its rise is a symptom of how susceptible America is to a conspiracy theory, and here for a roundtable discussion with the experts.